China’s Didi Chuxing prepares for IPO on U.S. exchange

June
11, 2021

3 min read

This story originally appeared on ValueWalk

Didi Chuxing, China’s Uber Technologies Inc (NYSE:UBER), published its filing to hold an initial public offering (IPO) in the U.S. It could be the largest IPO in the world this year.

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Didi Chuxing releases IPO documents

The ride-sharing firm didn’t share the size of its offering, but sources had told Reuters previously that it could raise about $10 billion and seek a valuation near $100 billion. According to Fox Business, Didi Chuxing’s stock market flotation would be the largest Chinese offering in the U.S. since Alibaba raised $25 billion in its IPO in 2014.

In its Thursday filing, Didi revealed that revenue growth slowed last year due to the pandemic, which halted the global ride-sharing industry due to lockdowns around the world.

The company posted 141.7 billion yuan (US$22.17 billion) in revenue for last year, compared to 154.8 billion yuan the year before. Didi reported a net loss of 10.6 billion yuan last year, compared to its loss of 9.7 billion yuan the year before.

Despite the slowdown in 2020, Didi Chuxing has had a strong year in 2021 due to the reopening of businesses in China. The ride-sharing company’s revenue more than doubled from 20.5 billion yuan in last year’s first quarter to 42.2 billion yuan (US$6.4 billion) for this year’s first quarter.

Opportunities in Chinese offerings

Grab, the largest ride-sharing firm in Singapore, went public in the U.S. earlier this year through a merger with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) with backing from investment firm Altimeter. Chinese companies raised $12 billion from U.S. listings last year, which was more than triple the amount they raised in the U.S. the year before, based on data from Refinitiv. According to Fox Business, Chinese companies are expected to raise even more than what they raised last year on Chinese floats on U.S. exchanges.

Didi merged with rival Kuaidi in 2015 to create its core business, a mobile app that enables users to hail rides in privately owned vehicles, carpools and even buses in some areas. The company generated $20.4 billion in revenue last year from its ride-sharing business, but CNBC noted that its app reveals several other offerings related to moving, gas stations, personal finance and bike-sharing.

Didi is preparing to list its American Depository Shares on the New York Stock Exchange or the Nasdaq using the ticker symbol “DIDI.” CEO Cheng Wei said last year that they aim to have 800 million monthly active users and complete 100 million orders per day by 2022.