Ant Financial, more recently known as Ant Group’s stock exchange listing previously scheduled for today and poised to generate $37 billion in what would have been the biggest IPO in history, suddenly had their debut on the Shanghai Stock Exchange suspended until further notice and more recently that of Hong Kong as well.
According to the company’s executives, plans to embrace regulation will be taken seriously in the future after some discussions surrounding material changes from failing to meet the conditions for listing and providing information disclosures.
Ant Group, closely affiliated with the Alibaba Group and which in descriptive terms can be likened to Amazon in territoriality with as many as 730 million in monthly users on its Alipay App in China and handles more transactions than Mastercard and Visa in China alone was suspended by regulators.
Despite being categorized as a technology company, chinese regulators have classified it under the financial sector. The group currently valued at $315 billion or $400 billion based on some reports crashed out of its IPO listing few days away to its debut on the Shanghai Stock Exchange which spotlights one of the major setbacks of doing business in China.
The China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission and the PBOC recently proposed tightening its grip on the micro-lending sector, a key business area for Ant – Huabei may need to make some provisions to cater to fresh demands that will allow for it to meet the regulations of the micro-lending sector.