China’s Lufax files for US IPO against backdrop of rising tensions

Gareth Jones

October 9, 2020

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Gareth Jones

Lufax, one of China’s biggest online lending platforms, has announced plans for a US IPO even as the Trump administration pushes ahead with plans to delist companies from the country. The business was valued at $39.4bn in a funding round in early 2019.

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The Trump administration has said it will delist Chinese companies from its markets if they do not provide US regulators full access to their audit reports. That has prompted Chinese groups, including ecommerce companies Alibaba and JD.com, to raise billions of dollars in Hong Kong to hedge the risk of being removed from US exchanges. In its filing to the SEC, Lufax flagged risks from the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, political unrest in Hong Kong and US sanctions on Chinese companies as factors that “could have a material adverse effect on our business, prospects, financial condition and results of operations”.

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