China Citic Bank, the mainland's seventh-largest lender by assets, said its initial public offering in the first half of next year will comprise both H- and A-shares, the South China Morning Post reported. The bank "100% owned by state-owned conglomerate Citic Group" has already applied to the China Securities Regulatory Commission for permission to make a simultaneous offering in Hong Kong and Shanghai, said Zhang Qiang, the bank's assistant president and general manager of corporate banking at a conference in Beijing over the weekend. The bank plans to raise US$257 billion in Hong Kong but has yet to say how much it intends to make on the sale of A-shares in Shanghai. The bank's capital adequacy ratio stands at 9.1% – higher than the government's minimum 8% requirement – since Citic Group sold US$1.08 billion of bonds last year to enrich the bank's capital, the newspaper reported. GE Capital, Grupo Santander, BNP Paribas, Barclay's and Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria are among those competing to purchase a 5-10% strategic stake in the bank, one of the last countrywide commercial lenders without a foreign partner.