Hong Kong Tops Global IPO Market in 2025

Hong Kong raised roughly $34 billion in 2025 to become the world's top listing venue for the first time since 2019, driven by mainland champions and a record run of A+H dual listings.

Hong Kong has retaken its place as the world’s busiest venue for new share sales. The Hong Kong stock exchange raised about HK$272 billion, roughly US$34.3 billion, across its 2025 listings, the most of any market on earth and a position the city last held in 2019, according to KPMG. That total was about 210% higher than the HK$88 billion the exchange managed in 2024, and it left New York and Nasdaq in second and third place with US$20.3 billion and US$19.2 billion respectively. The rebound was built almost entirely on mainland Chinese companies choosing Hong Kong, often as a second home alongside an existing Shanghai or Shenzhen listing.

A battery maker reset the bar

The deal that announced Hong Kong’s return was Contemporary Amperex Technology, the world’s largest electric-vehicle battery maker. CATL raised HK$41 billion, about US$5.2 billion after the greenshoe was exercised, in May, making it the biggest listing anywhere in 2025 until a US biotech deal later edged past it, Bloomberg reported. The stock jumped more than 16% on its debut, and CATL said about 90% of the proceeds would fund a battery plant in Hungary serving European carmakers including BMW, Stellantis and Volkswagen, per CNBC. CATL already trades in Shenzhen, so the Hong Kong float gave it offshore dollars for overseas expansion without giving up its mainland base.

The A+H wave did the heavy lifting

CATL was not a one-off. The defining feature of 2025 was the surge of “A+H” deals, where a company already listed on a mainland A-share market adds an H-share listing in Hong Kong. KPMG counted a record run of these dual listings and a pipeline of more than 300 active IPO applications heading into 2026, including dozens of A+H candidates, according to its year-end review. In the first half of the year alone, eight dual-listed companies raised over HK$78 billion, roughly US$10 billion, which worked out to about 72% of all IPO proceeds during that stretch, reported feature-asia. For these issuers the logic is straightforward. An H-share listing buys access to international capital and a currency for cross-border deals, while the A-share line keeps them anchored to domestic investors. The wave of returning mainland champions is part of a broader regional reshuffling of where technology companies choose to raise money.

Consumer names brought in the crowds

The other story of 2025 was retail demand, and nothing captured it like Mixue, the budget bubble-tea and ice-cream chain. Its Hong Kong offering was oversubscribed by more than 5,000 times in the retail tranche, with individual investors committing margin loans that set a market record, Yicai Global reported. The shares climbed roughly a third on their first day of trading, according to CNBC. Bankers credit two things: the 2023 overhaul of Hong Kong’s listing rules, which streamlined the process, and simple pent-up appetite after several lean years when very few sizable deals priced. Strong consumer debuts pulled retail money back into the market and gave later issuers confidence to launch.

Beijing and the STAR Market are part of the plan

The Hong Kong revival is happening alongside a deliberate policy push on the mainland. The China Securities Regulatory Commission has pledged deeper capital-market reforms aimed at getting more technology companies listed, Reuters and Yahoo Finance reported. The clearest signal came in June 2026, when Shanghai revived the STAR Market’s “fifth set” of listing standards, opening pre-profit IPOs to loss-making AI large-model developers, quantum-tech firms and other frontier sectors such as 6G, brain-computer interfaces and commercial space, as TechTimes reported. The STAR board also added a growth tier marked with a “U” for unprofitable companies, with a path to graduate once they post two consecutive years of net profit. The intent is to keep China’s hardest tech stories listing at home or in Hong Kong rather than New York. For investors tracking the equivalent move in semiconductors, the China AI chip listings story covers how chipmakers are using these same channels.

Foreign money tests the water again

The harder question is whether global funds are truly back. After years of underweighting Chinese equities, large international investors are showing tentative signs of returning, and analysts expect any Federal Reserve rate cuts in 2026 to accelerate that buying, per Nomura. Closer financial ties between Hong Kong and Middle Eastern sovereign funds have added another pool of demand. The reported momentum is real but uneven, and the figures cited for foreign participation vary by source and should be treated as estimates rather than settled facts. Some of the appetite is also defensive: tighter US scrutiny, including proposed measures like the BioSecure Act, has pushed Chinese healthcare and tech firms to abandon American listing plans for Hong Kong, KPMG noted. That contrasts with the separate recovery underway in the United States, traced in our US IPO market reopening coverage.

The geopolitical overhang has not gone away

For all the records, the rally sits on top of unresolved risk. The same trade and technology tensions that drove companies out of New York could just as easily cool foreign demand for Hong Kong paper if relations sour further. Delisting threats against US-listed Chinese firms, export controls and the prospect of new sanctions remain live concerns, and they help explain why so many issuers want the optionality of an A+H structure rather than betting on a single market. PwC expects Hong Kong fundraising to reach HK$320 billion to HK$350 billion in 2026, which would extend the run, the firm said, though it framed the forecast against a backdrop of continued macro and geopolitical uncertainty. Where Hong Kong fits in the wider 2026 calendar, alongside other venues, is laid out in our Gulf and Southeast Asia IPO outlook.

FAQ

Why did Hong Kong overtake New York for IPOs in 2025?

A record wave of A+H dual listings by mainland Chinese companies, anchored by CATL’s roughly US$5.2 billion deal, drove HKEX to about US$34.3 billion in proceeds, well ahead of the New York and Nasdaq exchanges, according to KPMG. The 2023 listing-rule overhaul and strong retail demand for names like Mixue added fuel.

What is an A+H listing?

It is when a company already listed on a mainland A-share market in Shanghai or Shenzhen adds a separate H-share listing in Hong Kong. The structure gives the issuer both domestic and international investors, plus an offshore currency for overseas expansion, while keeping its mainland listing intact.

Is the Hong Kong IPO boom expected to continue in 2026?

Forecasters are cautiously positive. PwC projects HK$320 billion to HK$350 billion in fundraising for 2026, and KPMG cited a pipeline of more than 300 applications. Both flagged geopolitical and macro risks as the main threats to that outlook.

Hong Kong Reclaims the IPO Crown as Mainland Tech Champions Come Home