On 28 July 2022, Keda Industrial Group Co., Ltd. (KEDA, Stock Code: 600499) successfully issued global depositary receipts (GDRs) and was listed on the SIX Swiss Exchange. KEDA issued a total of 12 million GDRs at US$14.43 per GDR, raising a total of US$173 million. The GDRs corresponded to 60 million A-shares of the company. The offering made KEDA among the first batch of Chinese companies to enter the Swiss capital market after the expansion of the Shanghai-London Stock Connect.
KEDA is Asia’s largest and world’s second largest supplier of building ceramic machinery and equipment. Extending to the downstream ceramics industry in emerging African countries, KEDA invested in the ceramic production bases in those countries, becoming a leading overseas ceramics supplier in Africa.
In February 2022, the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) issued the Provisions on the Regulation of the Depositary Receipt Business under the Stock Connect Scheme between Domestic and Overseas Stock Exchanges to further facilitate cross-border investment and financing, promote global resources allocation, and drive the institutional opening-up of the capital markets. Considered to be an upgraded version of the “Shanghai-London Stock Connect”, the Provisions included the eligible SZSE-listed companies in the domestic market, and expanded the overseas issuance markets to Switzerland, Germany and beyond.
As a listed company that thoroughly implements the globalisation strategy, KEDA, in an active response to national policies, promotes the issuance of GDRs. Since launching its GDR project in April 2022, KEDA was the first among the four Swiss GDR issuers to announce a specific issuance plan, obtain CSRC approval, and complete the issuance pricing and listing.
King & Wood Mallesons (KWM) acted as the PRC counsel for the sole global coordinator and joint bookrunner. The KWM team participated in the whole process of legal due diligence, domestic and overseas regulatory approval, and preparation of transaction documents, prospectus, and domestic announcement and its release. The KWM team was highly recognized by the client and other intermediary teams for accurate and efficient services throughout the process.
This project was led by partner Fan Lingli with support from Li Chengyang, Yang Song, Li Yaolin, Chen Rui and Chen Anqi.