Suspicions raised by mainland Chinese firm’s ‘stock exchange’ platform in Hong Kong

蘋果日報 2021/06/22 06:55


A stock-listing website set up by a mainland Chinese company is raising suspicions among some Hong Kong investors wary about discrepancies in its claimed services and even its address in the city.
The platform, HKEE Limited, has a Chinese name that translates as “Hong Kong stock exchange”, giving the impression that it is a stock-trading entity like the real Hong Kong Stock Exchange. One Hong Kong investor  told Apple Daily that she found HKEE suspicious, after reading a document from a company listed on the platform.
On its website, HKEE describes itself as a “professional service platform for international share transactions designed for Hong Kong and mainland Chinese small and medium-sized companies.”
Yet HKEE says it does not actually provide a platform for public trading of shares. Rather, it says shareholders must sell their stocks “using legal means.”
HKEE invites local and mainland startup companies to list on its platform, saying it accepts listing applications on recommendations from its member organizations. The companies HKEE lists are given a trade name, a stock code and a certificate – all services that are provided by the HKSE.
HKEE also claims to be a private market independent of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
Apple Daily has found a discrepancy in the company’s Hong Kong office address. HKEE’s website claims its office is located at Two IFC, Hong Kong’s prominent office complex. But the city’s government Companies Registry gives a different address: Wu Chung House, a 29-year-old commercial building in Wan Chai.
HKEE’s Hong Kong office refuses to deal with clients face-to-face. “We don’t receive ordinary clients in Hong Kong,” an HKEE employee said by phone to an Apple Daily reporter who made repeated requests to visit the office. “Please contact the [company’s Beijing operation].”
An HKEE staff member handling listing matters told an Apple Daily reporter that prospective listers can get their applications approved as quickly as seven days after submitting the required documents and paying a 69,000 yuan (US$10,680) listing fee.
After that, the listed companies can recommend other firms to list on the platform and receive 50% of the fee as a bonus for a successful case, the HKEE employee said.
As of this month, HKEE has published listing notices for more than 50 companies on its industry sector boards, including an “innovation and technology board” that resembles the sci-tech innovation board on Shanghai’s stock exchange. Most of the listed firms are from mainland China, with a small number registered in Hong Kong.
HKEE is owned by Liaoning-based businessperson Chen Shouhua through his China Private Equity Investment Fund Association. Chen owns at least one company listed with HKEE. Another HKEE executive, Chen Tiedong, previously owned half the shares of another HKEE-listed firm.
Both the Hong Kong Stock Exchange and the Securities and Futures Commission, the city’s regulator, declined to comment.
Click here for Chinese version
---------------------------------
Apple Daily’s all-new English Edition is now available on the mobile app: bit.ly/2yMMfQE
To download the latest version,
Or search Appledaily in App Store or Google Play