China Yangtze Power Co., Ltd. (CYPC) set the price for its offering of global depositary receipts (GDRs) at USD 26.46 each and conditional trading in the GDRs on London Stock Exchange (LSE) has commenced on 25 September 2020. The company is expected to become officially listed on LSE on 30 September 2020. Assuming that the over-allotment option is fully exercised, the offering will comprise 76 million GDRs, representing 760 million underlying A shares, with the money to be raised amounting to USD 2,011 million appropriately. The offering will make CYPC the first single A-share listed company to issue GDRs and be listed on the LSE, as well as the first central non-financial SOE to be listed both in Shanghai and London under the Shanghai-London Stock Connect (SLSC).
As China's largest listed power company and the world's largest listed hydropower company, CYPC is primarily engaged in hydropower generation and currently owns and operates four huge hydropower stations - Three Gorges, Gezhouba, Xiluodu and Xiangjiaba - along the trunk stream of the Yangtze River, among which Three Gorges Dam is the world's largest power station in terms of installed capacity.
Faced with complex and changing external environment and with the efforts of CYPC and other parties in the issuance, the offering has made a number of innovations under the SLSC mechanism, including:
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The first GDR offering in accordance with Rule 144A;
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The first GDR offering awarded the Green Economy Mark; and
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The biggest sized GDR offering under the mechanism.
Goldman Sachs International, UBS AG London Branch, Huatai Financial Holdings (Hong Kong) Limited and CLSA Limited acted as the joint global coordinators and joint global bookrunners for the offering. China International Capital Corporation (UK) Limited, Citigroup Global Markets Limited, Credit Suisse Securities (Europe) Limited, Merrill Lynch International, and Morgan Stanley & Co. International plc acted as the joint bookrunners for the issuance.
As the PRC counsel to the underwriter, King & Wood Mallesons (KWM) was involved in each stage throughout the offering, including legal due diligence, internal decision-making, domestic regulatory approval, preparation of transaction documents, drafting of prospectus, as well as drafting and publication of domestic and overseas announcements. The KWM team was well recognized by its client and other parties in the offering for its efficient, quality and professional legal services. Up to now, KWM has advised on all the three GDR offerings under the SLSC.
The offering was led by partner Su Zheng, and supported by Ye Shengjie, Chen Dongxu and Zhang Xiang.