Dismal debuts for three more cos

The second quarter ended badly for Chinese companies seeking Hong Kong IPOs, and Three Mainland companies fell at least 10% on their first day of trading and new listings have been relatively sour, the Standard of Hong Kong reported. Three companies fell at least 10% on Thursday, their first day of trading. The big winner was the Bank of Communications that rose 13% on its first trading day, June 23. The also-rans included China COSCO Holdings, by far the biggest of Thursday's launches, but a loser that fell almost 15% before a feeble rally. The other two IPOs were SIM Technology and GST Holdings. COSCO, SIM and GST together earned only HD$10.5bn (US$1.35bn), of which COSCO container shipping took HK$9.5bn. Some analysts blamed insufficient support from underwriters and uncertainty over COSCO.