T&I AsiaWatch for July 7th, 2025
Another IPO flood on the HKEX keeps us in sixth place over 15 years.
Editor’s Note: China IPOs YTD equal to the combined world total. HKEX had 24 IPOs filed last week with 44 listed and 168 filed YTD as the first non-profit STAR IPOs begin. BSE has a record 9 IPOs, but few with VC or PE backing. LSE IPOs hit a 30 year low in the first half of 2025. The USA had 7 filings last week. TSE: 3 July IPOs. KKR led Asia (again) with 3 PE deals. AMP and SC Capital are in legal trouble (again) over 3 PE deals. Listed GPs continue a return to Nov. ’24 highs, but remain down 10-20% despite regulators and exchanges good news. T&I’s Research Desk (me) admits treading water for a second week; two dozen HKEX IPOs have gone unread so that I can send this to you today. I reliably estimate two-thirds have VC or PE backing. The former somnolent trading floor of the HKEX, which looked more like a lending library from its visitors gallery, is now the busiest exchange in the world.
Australia: AMP set a new record with two suits filed against it in a single week over insurance and property fraud. ASIC sued Sanjeev Gupta’s GFG Alliance for failure to file financials. KKR bought agriculture infrastructure business ProTen from Aware Super (pension). Local real estate investment GP Salter Brothers — infamous for its failed 2024 A$550 million bailout of corrupt Star Casino backed by HK’s Chow Tai Fook founding Cheng family — was tied to iProsperity, the HNI visa scam for PRC nationals founded by fugitive Michael Gu. In another echo of the post 2003 internet bubble collapse Woolworth's announced a second recent closure of a portfolio from the VC funded e-commerce bubble of 2015-2025. Close down costs alone are $A100 million. Australia’s oldest PE firm Washington Soul purchased $450 million of its own debt following its recent merger.
China: SOE China Merchants Group seized failing “fentanyl king” Humanwell Healthcare, the pharmaceutical and bio investor briefly in the public eye in 2024’s U.S. election when hedge fund investor Bridgewater’s CEO — run by the now, U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania, David McCormick — saw PRC ties and fentanyl put forward as a straw man to oppose his election. Further to notes about endowments and pensions viewed as a new source of tax revenue in Australia and the USA, this just in: China’s National Auditor found local governments misappropriated tens of billions of yuan of state-run pension funds for various purposes, including debt repayment, as they face mounting financial strain. SOE bad debt manager China Great Wall AM announced restructuring and recapitalization by really-bad-truly-horrible debt manager SOE Central Huijin. In other news of SOE bad debt managers Daija Insurance reported the sale of two more assets in Belgium and Korea it absorbed in the collapse of failed Anbang Insurance. In related news — reflecting State Council policies seeking to keep all plates spinning for China’s Great Wall of Debt — the HKEX had 24 IPOs filed last week, with 44 listed of the 168 filed YTD. 2025 China IPOs now equal the world’s major markets combined total. And that’s before as the first STAR Market IPOs begin this week. The last time we saw this level of IPO exits was the spring to late summer of 2000 in the USA; it didn’t end well. The FT declared that HK’s market “leaves China Behind.” We get it; British pride is at work, but it ignores the fact that it’s PRC companies going public on HKEX. SOE-VC Fund backed Nvidia wannabe, IC maker Moore Threads will file to raise $1.1 billion in a STAR market IPO. SOE Shenzhen Metro gave a $872 million sixth loan (in six months) to failing real estate developer Vanke. Lingua Sinica reports CCP’s extinguishing “soft resistance” in a retreat to old school communist practices. STAR Market approved a first IPO for an unprofitable company (Wuhan Heyuan Biotechnology) under revised rules that allows loss-making firms to IPO. There are hundreds of such potential IPOs in the STAR queue. In another reminder of OG Communist policies, two securities officials fell to their death during graft investigations. Back on the topic of keeping all the plates spinning, domestic startups raised issues over China-USA VC valuations, pointing to AI and robotics’ widely differing metrics for similar companies. Note to bent out of shape China startups; be careful what you wish for. And while I’m breaking the fourth wall, giving advice to ambitious SOE China startups from my 23 years of covering VC and PE in China: take a moment and read: “Xi Jinping may “step down” in August.”
India: Quasi secondaries continue to rise with ADIA, CPPIB’s consortium buyout of BII, others-backed solar manufacturer ReNew Energy Global. Begur & Partners reported SEBI’s creation of a new class of alternatives for India: Specialized Investment Funds. The Bengaluru ban on VC-backed Bike-taxis sees 150,000 bike-taxi drivers’ income fall by half. So much for the Silicon Valley mantra “ask forgiveness not permission” applied to India. The Economic Times projects up to $2 billion will be raised by the 12 filings to IPO with SEBI last week. Do I need to write that counting your (over) valuations before you’ve even IPO’ed is an exercise in self-deception? LPs by the way, are not buying (or receiving distributions from) any of this BS, that includes a record 9 IPOs open on the BSE this week. IPOs to be certain, are on a roll in India; but not PE/VC backed IPOs. Geopolitics intrudes on PM Modi (and Apple’s) plans to shift manufacturing of iPhones to India after Foxconn pulled 300 engineers from India in reaction to threats by Chinese regulators over its migration of operations from China. KKR's second PE deal of the week in Asia was its $1.4 billion sale of its JB Chemicals & Pharmaceuticals to Torrent Pharmaceuticals, the largest PE-backed, bio-pharmaceutical deal here in the last several years. JioBlackrock's mutual fund cum brokerage JV (announced July of 2023) is approved by SEBI. The impact on the 10 VC or bank-backed brokerage portals is yet to be determined, but local founders already fear the worst. In another of the growing list of VC startups suing one another in real or nuisance actions, Accel, B Capital, Chiratae, IFC, others-backed Bizongo replied to a complaint filed with the EOW by Tradecred accusing Bizongo with misappropriation of funds related to Bizongo’s lack of payments to Tradecred for logistics service payments.
Korea: Affinity exited remaining Shinhan Financial equity earning a reported $220 million capital gain. Centroid Investment Partners buyout of TaylorMadeGolf grinds to a halt — much like MBK’s buyout of Korea Zinc — after the owning family of retailer F&F announced its own bid to buy TaylorMade. DB Insurance offered $1.48 billion for US-based insurer Fortegra. KKR and Lantern Green find themselves in an MBK-styled takeover fight with shareholders, after solar energy generator TACE founders reneged on their agreement, to pursue self ownership. Samsung put its $44 billion USA IC fab on hold.
Malaysia: Standard Chartered is sued for $2.7 billion by Malaysia’ 1MDB liquidator Kroll, accusing the bank of handing then-PM Razak $150 million, his wife tens of million and their stepson, who invested millions in the production of the Wolf of WallStreet.
Philippines: Jollibee founder-backed Hotel101 IPO’ed on the Nasdaq.
Thailand: PM Thaksin earns a new record for Asia’s banana republic families, is suspended
Singapore: KKR’s Ascend Asia Capital bought Singapore-financial advisory firm Finexis.
Uzbekistan: AFC Uzbekistan publishes its may report; emerging Asia continues to reward.
Vietnam: VinaCapital published an assessment of President Trump's tariff deal and made four transactions in its own shares.
Transaction Pace: I’m making another call with an estimate of 20 IPOs on the HKEX, having foreign, domestic or SOE VC or PE backing, to report another bellwether week of 62 transactions for 2025. And while I’m tempted to write a diatribe on the results that occur when a centrally controlled economy touts economic progress, I’m also reminded of all the fakery of the VC-backed IPO boom from 1998 to 2002 in the USA. Having read enough of the IPOs prospectuses from both eras, as I’m making a fair guess at real and possible outcomes, I’m finding it hard to be assured that China’s SOE-Command economy emulation of capitalism is less effective on VC/PE outcomes. And yes, I remain a believer in Adam Smith’s Invisible Hand economic theories. Squaring the circle of those two normally at-odds philosophies will, however, have to pass to better editorialists with more time. In terms of deals, KKR had a second, back to back week of leading transactions in Asia with three closed and at or near completion for two more in the works or struggling deals.
Jerry Borrell, Editor in Chief, T&I Asia. © 2025 T&I