FWD Group Holdings Ltd., the Asian insurer backed by billionaire Richard Li, has refiled an application for a Hong Kong initial public offering as it now weighs a listing next year amid market volatility.
The renewed filing will grant more time for the insurer to continue with preparations for a share sale in the city. The company has been seeking to raise about $1 billion in an IPO, which could take place as early as the first quarter, although the final size and timing haven’t been formally decided, Bloomberg News reported this month.
FWD’s value of new business rose 24.6% year-on-year to $405 million in the first half of 2022, on a constant exchange rate basis, according to the latest filing on Tuesday. While the company reported an adjusted loss of $333 million for the six months ended June 30, its operating profit before tax jumped about 111% to $200 million from a year ago, a separate statement shows.
FWD was initially looking to go public in the U.S., where it had filed for an IPO that could have raised as much as $3 billion. The plan hit a snag amid US regulators’ increasing unease over the long arm of the Chinese government, after a post-IPO probe of Didi Global Inc. kicked off a wide-ranging crackdown on overseas-listed firms.
The insurer in December switched its listing venue to Hong Kong and first applied for a share sale in the Asian financial hub two months later. However, the company in May decided to postpone due to weak market conditions. Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs Group Inc., China Merchants International and JPMorgan Chase & Co. are the joint sponsors of the Hong Kong IPO.
FWD earlier raised more than $1.6 billion in private placements with investors including an insurer backed by Apollo Global Management Inc. The placements were set to value the company at about $9 billion, which would imply about 1.2 to 1.3 times its embedded value, people familiar with the matter said at the time.
Photograph: An FWD Group Holdings Ltd. store in Hong Kong, China, on Tuesday, March 1, 2022. FWD Group, the Asian insurer backed by Hong Kong billionaire Richard Li, filed an application for an initial public offering in the city, after U.S.-China tensions scuppered more ambitious plans for an overseas debut. Photo credit: Paul Yeung/Bloomberg
Related:
- Asian Insurer FWD Eyes Hong Kong IPO in 2023: Sources
- Insurer FWD Delays $1 Billion Hong Kong IPO: Sources
- Insurer FWD Wins Approval for Hong Kong IPO
- FWD Group Withdraws U.S. IPO Plan, Pivoting Instead to Hong Kong
Topics Carriers
Was this article valuable?
Here are more articles you may enjoy.
Soaring Insurance Costs Hit as US Buyers Finally Get a Break on Car Prices 
USAA to Lay Off 220 Employees 
Trump’s Bond Insurer Tells Judge Shortfall Is ‘Inconceivable’ 
Zuckerberg Avoids Personal Liability in Meta Addiction Suits 
