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Latham Advises Kuaishou Technology on US$5.4 Billion Hong Kong IPO

February 9, 2021

IPO is the largest listing on HKEX since September 2019, and the first by a Chinese short video platform.

Latham & Watkins advised Kuaishou Technology on its US$5.4 billion initial public offering and 144A/Regulation S offering on the Main Board of The Stock Exchange of Hong Kong Limited (HKEX). The transaction represents the largest IPO on HKEX since September 2019, and the first short video platform company out of China to go public.

Kuaishou’s global offering consisted of 365,218,600 Class B Shares (subject to the Over-allotment Option), of which 356,088,100 Class B Shares were initially offered under the International Offering and 9,130,500 Class B Shares were initially offered under the Hong Kong Public Offering. The offering was oversubscribed more than 1,200 times, making it one of Hong Kong's most oversubscribed IPOs. The final offer price of Kuaishou’s global offering was set at HK$115.00 per Class B Share, the high-end of the indicative offer price range stated in its prospectus. Morgan Stanley Asia Limited, Merrill Lynch Far East Limited, and China Renaissance Securities (Hong Kong) Limited acted as joint sponsors for the offering.

Kuaishou is a leading content community and social platform. Globally, Kuaishou is the largest live streaming platform by gross billings from virtual gifting and average live streaming monthly paying users ("MPU"), the second largest short video platform by average daily active users ("DAU"), and the second largest live streaming e-commerce platform by gross merchandise value ("GMV"), all for the nine months ended September 30, 2020, according to iResearch.

The Latham team was led by Hong Kong partners Benjamin Su, Cathy Yeung, Daying Zhang, and Terris Tang, with associates George Zheng, Xueting Zhong, Yan Zhang, foreign legal consultants David Wen, Lizzy Zhang, and paralegals Amy Tai, Candy Mak in Hong Kong, associates Kevin Chow in Shanghai, and Olivia Lai in Beijing. Advice on 40 Act matters was provided by Chicago partner Sabki Nabil and associate John Reinert, and on tax matters by New York partner Gregory Hannibal and associate Seung Hyun Yang.

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