ACGA Research Director Jane Moir reports on a very rare event  The past two decades has seen a fair number of companies list in Hong Kong and quickly unravel as findings of fabricated invoices, bogus accounts and plundered assets come to light. The board vanishes, the firm de-lists, shareholders take a hit and the market moves on. It is ...

Two recent regulatory cases in India, one relating to tax and the other auditing, highlight the perils of not listening to market feedback before making policy.  Regulators worldwide consult stakeholders when they envisage new laws and market rules or seek to amend those already on the books. Public consultations enable policy makers to ...

As Asian markets jump on the SPAC bandwagon, Hong Kong consultation reflects city’s chequered history with shell companies and stock manipulation, according to Jane Moir, ACGA Research Director. On Friday 17 September, Hong Kong’s stock exchange released a consultation on Special Purpose Acquisition Companies (SPACs). Just five of 101 ...

Corporate governance in Indonesia and the Philippines is once again at risk of going backwards. What can be done? Rating corporate governance standards in Indonesia and the Philippines can at times be a Sisyphean task. In the 20 years since ACGA started ranking the macro quality of Asian corporate governance, neither market has placed higher in ...

A former co-head of HKEX’s IPO vetting team is in the dock for bribery and misconduct in public office. ACGA’s Vivian Yau is following the case. As both sides prepare closing arguments in the trial of Eugene Yeoh Kim-loong, ACGA looks back at six weeks of evidence involving 30 witnesses—and one unexpected revelation. Yeoh is on ...

China’s decision to take token stakes in key mainland entities of tech giants such as ByteDance and Weibo underscores a tactical shift toward more direct influence over private enterprises. We expect more to come—and it is unlikely to be limited to the tech sector. As reported last month in tech website The Information, the state ...

Bribery trial puts an awkward spotlight on the “global home of the IPO”  Hong Kong’s stock exchange has just turned 21 with much to celebrate. Profits are at a record high. Fundraising tops the charts globally. Geopolitics is creating a steady pipeline of mega China firms looking to depart the US for a ...

Affirmative action is needed to narrow the diversity abyss. ACGA is calling for a 30% quota of women on boards within four years as a proactive step to curb male domination at Hong Kong’s listed companies. We believe bold moves are necessary and have outlined our proposal in a submission to HKEX as part of its consultation on the CG Code ...

Plans to further relax entry requirements for secondary listings will deepen a regulatory divide. A burgeoning group of secondary-listed firms including Alibaba, JD.com and NetEase who enjoy a slew of waivers from market rules now account for nearly a sixth of Hong Kong’s total market cap of HK$52 trillion. Their ranks are set to increase ...

Bricks and mortar embraced technology while the new economy kept things physical. Global tech giants such as Tencent, Xiaomi and Meituan shunned electronic shareholder meetings during Covid in 2020, opting for physical AGMs as their old economy peers such as banks and manufacturers went virtual. ACGA surveyed 600 companies across the ...

Plan to limit public access to directors’ details a major blow to transparency. ACGA has written an open letter to the Hong Kong government and the Legislative Council urging the administration to shelve plans to withhold directors’ details from public scrutiny. There has been no public consultation on the proposed move despite public ...