Biz Scene: Grapevine

Share sale

Focus Media Holding Ltd, China's largest publicly traded advertising company, and existing owners raised $888.4 million in the second-largest US share sale by a Chinese firm this year.

The Shanghai-based company and shareholders sold more than 13.7 million American depositary receipts at $64.75 apiece, Bloomberg reported citing an e-mail sent to investors yesterday.

Focus Media itself offered 5 million ADRs, it said. Focus Media may sell another 2 million ADRs to cover excess demand and stabilize its share price, the e-mail said.

Huatai IPO plan

Huatai Securities Co plans to go public through an initial public offering in the first quarter of next year, Shanghai Securities News reported, citing unnamed sources.

Huatai has started changing its structure into that of a shareholding company to prepare for the share sale, the newspaper reported.

Huatai also plans to expand by acquiring 80.12 percent of Xintai Securities Co, pending regulatory approval, it said. Huatai is China's eighth biggest brokerage by assets as of the end of 2006.

(China Daily 11/08/2007 page15)