STAR Market to introduce new growth tier

A growth tier will be added to the STAR Market at the Shanghai Stock Exchange as part of the efforts to deepen reform in the technology-focused board, Wu Qing, chairman of the China Securities Regulatory Commission, said on Wednesday.

Wu released the message during the two-day Lujiazui Forum held in Shanghai.

The fifth set of listing rules for companies to float at the STAR Market, which allows the listing of rapidly growing but still unprofitable companies from biomedicine and semiconductor sectors, will be restarted, according to Wu.

This is aimed to more precisely serve the quality technology companies with major technology breakthroughs, broad business prospects and continued investment in research and development. There will also be special policy arrangements to strengthen information disclosure, risk disclosure and investor suitability management, Wu said.

An additional six reform measures will be introduced for the STAR Market. Among these, a pilot mechanism introducing senior professional institutional investors to companies applicable to the fifth set of listing rules will be launched. A pilot program under which quality technology companies can go through pre-review for their initial public offering may be conducted, he said.

The applicable range of the fifth set of listing rules may be expanded to frontier sectors including artificial intelligence, commercial aviation and low-altitude economy, he added.

Unprofitable technology companies under review will be supported to carry out activities such as capital increase and share expansion targeting existing shareholders. The refinancing system for STAR Market companies and the criteria for identifying strategic investors will be completed. STAR Market-based investment products and related risk management tools will also be enriched, said Wu.

Wu also announced on Wednesday that the third set of listing rules at the ChiNext in the Shenzhen bourse, which allows unprofitable companies to go public, will take effect.

Registration of China's first two real estate investment trust products for data centers is scheduled to be approved on Wednesday, according to Wu. Technology companies will be further supported to conduct asset securitization and REIT-based financing by revitalizing their assets, such as intellectual property rights and data, he added.