The Hong Kong stock exchange is in turmoil after the recent crackdown from Beijing. The Chinese authorities attacked their own companies and also decided to punish Hong Kong for mass protests against a series of legislative initiatives. Statistics showed that at the beginning of the second half of this year the scope of initial public offerings (IPO) on the stock exchange in Hong Kong markedly reduced. Analysts attribute this to the beginning of Beijing's clampdown on its technology companies. The government’s actions caused the drop in IPO. The main share of IPOs on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange belongs to Chinese companies. For example, in the first six months of 2021, they accounted for more than $18 billion, which is 13.4 billion more than during the same period last year. In the second half of the year the situation changed dramatically. The $7 billion secondary stock offering of China Tourism Group Duty Free was supposed to be one of the key events, but now its future is in doubt. Analysts and bankers beware of investing in Chinese companies for fear of negative consequences. These severe measures also forced ByteDance, the owner of the social network TikTok, to postpone its IPO indefinitely. In July, Beijing presented a draft law according to which companies with a personal database of more than 1 million people are obliged to obtain approval from the authorities to enter stock exchanges in other countries. The Chinese government is concerned that third parties from other countries may get personal data of users. Independent experts announced the decision to be the world's billionaires' factory shudder. China's wealthiest tycoons have lost billions of dollars after Beijing has tightened its grip on huge tech companies.
