Hong Kong’s follow-on fundraising surge poised to continue, say top bankers

While global IPO markets remain tentative, Hong Kong has quietly engineered a pivot: the action isn’t at the IPO bell—it’s what comes after. Post-IPO equity fundraising in the city hit US$31.4 billion in the first half of 2025, already surpassing all of 2024 and setting up a possible return to the heady heights of 2021’s US$83.9 billion. This isn’t just about capital inflows—it’s a structural evolution in how Chinese firms and international investors now see the Hong Kong market.

At first glance, it may look like a rebound. In truth, it’s a recalibration. What we’re witnessing is not a boom in IPO activity, but a maturing ecosystem where listed firms are using Hong Kong not just to go public—but to raise capital strategically over time, in sync with expansion, R&D, and cross-border ambition.

Mainland firms are driving this resurgence, not because of loosened rules or cheap capital, but because they increasingly treat Hong Kong as a repeat fundraising base—not a one-off milestone. Share placements and convertible bonds are providing a capital bridge between IPO valuations and long-term business investment, especially for companies facing domestic credit tightening in China or US-China listing scrutiny elsewhere.

Investment bankers suggest this is not just opportunistic timing—it’s becoming operational strategy. Companies are spacing out capital injections post-IPO to manage dilution, match revenue timelines, and avoid dependency on over-leveraged mainland financing structures. This behavior is especially evident in tech, green energy, and advanced manufacturing firms that need sustained R&D spend but want currency exposure and international LP visibility.

This is where the divergence shows. While European capital markets continue to wrestle with retail pullback and US exchanges grapple with tech IPO fatigue, Hong Kong is threading a different needle. It’s positioning itself not just as a listing destination, but as a post-listing capital base for Chinese firms that want to stay in RMB-linked orbit while accessing global equity capital.

That regional positioning is critical. US exchanges are still seen as high-prestige—but also high-cost and high-regulation. Hong Kong, in contrast, offers proximity, currency familiarity, and a clearer political signal for Chinese issuers seeking policy safety. For many, it’s no longer about escaping to Nasdaq. It’s about staying close to Beijing, while raising capital with global optics.

What links the surge in follow-on fundraising isn’t just market timing. It’s structural capital demand from businesses recalibrating around R&D, infrastructure expansion, and export competitiveness. Tech and biotech companies in particular are using post-IPO proceeds to scale out production capabilities, expand into ASEAN markets, or build AI integration capacity—areas where government subsidies or domestic bank credit aren’t fast or flexible enough.

In that sense, follow-on offerings are becoming an institutional layer in China’s evolving capital stack. Hong Kong is not just a financing venue—it’s a regulatory arbitrage and capital coordination platform. That’s why bankers aren’t just forecasting more activity—they’re designing entire capital programs that sequence equity taps alongside government-linked procurement cycles or export deals.

There’s another angle at play: rebalancing. Global investors—particularly sovereign wealth funds and institutional allocators in the Gulf and Europe—are quietly rotating back into Chinese-linked assets after two years of geopolitical caution. But they’re doing so with new rules: no pre-IPO exposure, less tolerance for regulatory opacity, and a preference for liquidity flexibility.

Follow-on offerings fit that profile. They offer cleaner entry points, better governance disclosure (post-listing), and the ability to size positions incrementally. That’s especially attractive for allocators underweight China but seeking exposure without headline risk. The upshot? Hong Kong’s post-IPO fundraising ecosystem may be less visible than flashy IPOs—but it’s structurally more aligned with modern institutional behavior.

The pivot in Hong Kong isn’t about index performance or quarterly records. It’s about how capital structures are being rebuilt for long-term R&D, regional hedging, and cross-border credibility. For strategy leads and boardroom advisors, the signal is clear: if your capital model still depends on IPO-as-endgame thinking, you’re missing where the smart capital is now flowing.

The firms winning the next decade will be those that treat post-IPO liquidity as a design feature, not a fallback. That means pre-planned issuance programs, tighter alignment between capital cycles and tech roadmaps, and investor relations teams built for institutional choreography—not retail hype.

It also demands internal shifts—FP&A teams must scenario-plan multi-round equity infusions, CFOs must calibrate dilution tolerances across cycles, and founders must accept that capital isn’t just raised once, but staged to mirror execution. Follow-on capital is no longer optional padding—it’s a core part of capital market fitness. Leaders who ignore this will find themselves misaligned with allocator preferences and structurally unprepared for regional competitiveness. In this market, capital strategy isn’t episodic—it’s engineered.