The ambitious cross-border trading link between China and the UK, the Shanghai-London Stock Connect, was officially opened on Friday, with brokerage Huatai Securities being the first Chinese company to list in Britain via the connect.
Alibaba-backed Huatai said that it received the green light from China’s securities regulators to issue global depositary receipts on the London Stock Exchange. The company has previously said it hopes to raise at least $500 million from the program.
The Shanghai-London Stock Connect allows publicly traded companies in the two cities of a certain market capitalisation to list in each other’s exchanges. The launching of the connect comes as Beijing seeks to attract foreign investment to its ailing domestic markets.
“The program offers us access to one of the deepest and most influential capital markets in the world,” Zhou Yi, Chairman and CEO of Huatai, told Reuters.