Four more companies set to postpone IPOs

China's securities regulator said over the weekend that it had asked four firms to postpone their issuance of shares amid tightened efforts to protect investors, while experts claimed that recent reforms have not done enough to address long-running problems in the market.

So far, nine firms have postponed their listings since approval of IPOs resumed at the end of 2013, according to media reports.

Five of the nine firms have since resumed their listing plans, but four others, including Jiangsu Aosaikang Pharmaceutical Co and Beijing-based Ciming Health Checkup Group, are still pending.

"Some of the postponements were required by the regulator, and some were made voluntarily by the companies and underwriters," Zhang Xiaojun, spokesman for the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC). said on Friday.

The CSRC asked Jiangsu Aosaikang to postpone its IPO, given numerous market queries about possible overpricing of its shares and rumors of an imminent sell-off by one of its main pre-IPO shareholders.

For Ciming Health Checkup, the regulator said that some information in its roadshow prospectus needed to be further verified.

IPOs by two other companies - China Wafer Level CSP Co, a semiconductor packaging service provider, and Jiangsu Pacific Quartz Co, a quartz glass tube producer - were postponed because of claims about disclosure of false information, the CSRC said.

The watchdog's heightened supervision came after media reports that recent IPO reforms had failed to address the lingering problem of overvalued IPO prices and speculation in trading of new shares, as well as the issue of pre-IPO shareholders selling shares at a high price and transferring risks to smaller retail investors.

The CSRC said that reforms could not address all problems instantly, and that it is trying to address the problems with new rules.

Without tough implementation of delisting measures, the problem of high IPO prices and new share speculation is not likely to be resolved, Yin Zhongyu, general manager of the M&A Department of Great Wall Securities, told the Global Times on Sunday.

Valve producer Neway Valve (Suzhou) Co debuted on the Shanghai Stock Exchange on Friday, the first new stock to start trading after the long IPO moratorium. Its shares closed at 25.34 yuan ($4.15). up 43.49 percent from its IPO price of 17.66 yuan.

Its IPO price to earnings (P/E) ratio was equivalent to 46.47 times its 2012 profit, more than double the average P/E ratio of 21.25 for manufacturers listed in Shanghai.

The hike, close to the first day limit, showed that investors are still willing to speculate in new shares.

Despite the delisting rules, there are very few publicly traded firms being delisted from the stock market, which encourages investors to bet on new stocks without doing enough research into the firms' financial performance, Yin said.