With a total of 40 Chinese companies now listed on the US Nasdaq
exchange, representatives of the companies met with Nasdaq CEO
Robert Greifeld in Beijing on Tuesday to celebrate.
"In organizing this little ceremony, Nasdaq is clearly hunting
for more Chinese companies," said Zhang Zhimin, a senior analyst
with Securities Research.
Greifeld visited China in 2005 to meet with senior officials of
the companies currently listed, those seeking listing on Nasdaq and
with officials from bodies involved in the Chinese capital
markets.
Nine Chinese companies listed on Nasdaq in 2006 following
Greifeld's vist and six more have listed in the past two
months.
"China is our fastest-growing market outside the United States.
We are optimistic about the number of Chinese companies that can
list on Nasdaq," said Xu Guangxun, chief representative of Nasdaq
in China.
"Just look at the number of IPOs in China," Zhang commented.
The capital raised from initial public offerings (IPO) in China
topped 62 billion U.S. dollars last year, exceeding the US$48
billion raised in the United States for the first time, according
to an earlier forecast by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).
It predicted the IPOs would top 37 million on the mainland
markets and 20 billion dollars in Hong Kong in 2007.
Since Qiao Xing Universal Telephone Inc.'s debut in 1999, 40
Chinese companies valued at 28 billion US dollars, including the
major Chinese web portals Sina, Sohu and Baidu, have listed on
Nasdaq.
Nasdaq, the largest electronic screen-based equity securities
market in the United States, lists about 3,200 companies, including
Microsoft, Dell and Yahoo. The market value of these companies
exceeds US$4,000 billion.
(Xinhua News Agency April 4, 2007)