Weibo IPO: Chinese firm's Hong Kong debut tanks; shares trade 6% below issue price

Chinese social media giant Weibo made its debut in the stock market of Hong Kong on Wednesday as other China-based firms continue to reel under intense loss in valuation in the Asia-Pacific Market. Immediately after listing, the shares of Twitter-like application fell by more than 6% at $272.80 Hong Kong dollars ($34.98) per share, in what was its secondary listing. It is to be noted that the company's main listing is on the Nasdaq. Shares, which also opened at 6% i.e. 256.20 Hong Kong dollars ($34.98) per share, CNBC broadcaster reported.

The second listing joined other major China-based tech companies like Alibaba and JD.com, which are also listed in the US. With the latest drop, Nasdaq-listed stock has witnessed a fall of more than 10% in the past week. Meanwhile, Japan reported that its economy shrank by 3.6% in the third quarter, as per CNBC. Additionally, Hong Kong's Hang Seng index also sloped down 0.12% as Weibo made to the chart. This comes as Chinese developers continue to remain embroiled in crisis.

Chinese firms bear the brunt of US-China spat

As relations between US and Beijing continue to remain taught amid China's aggressive behaviour in the Indo-Pacific region, Chinese firms listed in the US and Hong Kong have found themselves caught in the middle of the whirlwind. As per a notice from the Hong Kong exchange, cited by CNBC, China's biggest developer Kaisa will be suspended today (Wednesday) from trading in shares as it looks unlikely that it could meet the $400 million offshore debts deadline ending Tuesday. What seems like is Kaisa has trodden on the path of debt-ridden Evergrande. Meanwhile, Chinese stocks in the mainland rose after a lousy session this morning. Shanghai Composite and Shenzhen Component jumped by 0.86% and 1.55%, respectively. Subsequently, Japanese Nikkei and Topic also climes 1.5% and 0.86%, respectively. South Korean Kospi was also 0.7% higher and Australian S&P/ASX 200 rose by 1.57%.

What is Weibo?

As described by BBC, Weibo is a Chinese microblogging site, similar to that of Twitter. It was launched in 2009 and has more than 570 million users compared to Twitter. The social media platform is China's second-biggest after Tencent's WeChat. Social media applications have emerged after Beijing banned platforms like Twitter, Facebook, making it an ideal ground for domestic social media firms to get a stronghold. Weibo is also one of the applications banned in India along with 223 others, including TikTok, PubG, ShareIT and many more. 

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