In the first quarter of this year, just 30 IPOs in the country raised 23.6 billion yuan ($3.26 billion), according to a report by Deloitte China. This represents a 56% and 64% decline, respectively, from the same period a year ago.

Many companies are reversing listing plans. In March, Swiss agricultural chemicals group Sygenta pulled its $9 billion Shanghai IPO after failing to get the green light from regulators. The company is not alone. In February, exchange data showed that 47 companies had pulled their listing plans since the start of the year—compared with 27 withdrawals a year ago.

The drop in activity coincides with the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) issuing a new set of rules to strengthen the supervision of public companies and news listing. Applications are also to be vetted more closely to prevent excessive fundraising and to crack down on fraud. The tougher line comes after Wu Qing—the former vice mayor of Shanghai nicknamed the Broker Butcher—was appointed chairman of the CRSC in February.  

At a March news conference, CSRC Vice Chairman Li Chao said guidelines are consistent with “strengthening regulation, preventing risks and promoting high-quality development.” Last month, the CRSC went further, saying it plans to hold random inspections on at least 25% of companies looking to public (up from 5% in 2023).

While the new rules are intended to restore confidence in China’s ailing stock market, they are having a short-term chilling effect on companies looking to go public. Deloitte China is now predicting that China’s A share IPO market will slow considerably in 2024, with around 115 to 155 new listings raising up to 166 billion yuan—lower than Deloitte expected. Meanwhile, the boards in Shanghai and Shenzhen could have anywhere between 25 and 35 listings, raising as much as 84 billion yuan. Nevertheless, it is anticipated that the tighter regulations will benefit the Chinese stock market in the long run as they set a higher benchmark for listed companies.

Government data released last month shows the real GDP growth rate for non-oil activities at about 4.4%, valuing the sector at about 1.7 trillion Saudi riyals (around $453 billion). This puts the kingdom on course to meet the objectives set out in Vision 2030, its broad program of policies and reforms, which holds economic diversification as one of its core objectives.

“The oil and gas sector is highly capital intensive and does not create the flow of job opportunities required to meet the supply of labor from a young and increasingly educated population,” says Nasser Saidi, an economist and Lebanon’s former minister of economy and trade, noting that around 30% of Saudi Arabia’s population is below age 30. 

To meet the challenge, the government has introduced incentives aimed at growing both services and manufacturing. As a result, much of the non-oil sector’s growth last year was driven by private consumption in areas like entertainment, hospitality and tourism. Together, they accounted for 40% of economic activity last year.

The tourism sector, which has attracted $13 billion in private investments recently, has been a particularly strong point, Saidi notes, luring 27 million foreign visitors last year in addition to 77 million domestic travelers.

These achievements did not stop the kingdom from suffering a 4.3% year-on-year decline in real GDP in 2023, however. The principal culprit was a drop in oil sector activity caused by voluntary production cuts put in place by the OPEC countries amid market concerns and rising output outside the group. Moreover, the majority of Saudi wealth is still to be found below ground, even when oil production is not considered. Mining and quarrying accounted for one-third of total non-oil output last year. Outside of these sectors, manufacturing accounted for more than 15% of real GDP, while real estate and construction contributed 14%.

By year-end, India is projected to have hosted more than 200 IPOs, making the country a global leader for new offerings in 2023. According to a report by EY, in the third quarter alone, 21 new listings appeared on India’s main market, raising $1.77 billion. Last year, just four IPOs raised $372 million.

“The IPO landscape is witnessing a surge in activity,” Adarsh Ranka, a partner with EY Global, said in a statement, “driven by both an urge to tap the capital markets pre- or post-Indian general elections and strong economic activity, positive domestic and foreign investor sentiment towards India.”

The spate of offerings, which started to pick up around April, marks a reversal in fortunes for India’s public markets. In January, investor confidence was battered when a report by short sellers Hindenburg Research accused the multinational Adani Group of accounting malpractice, sending share prices into freefall and sparking fear of contagion. 

Much of the recent IPO activity has been in sectors such as industrial products, technology, consumer products, and retail. The three largest IPOs in the third quarter were cable maker RR Kable, Concord Biotech, and Samhi Hotels. Momentum did not slow in November, which also produced an unusually high number of offerings. 

At the time of writing, five companies are on the cusp of going public, expecting to raise some $840 million between them in a single week. The most significant is Tata Technologies, the engineering and research unit of the conglomerate, with a price range of 475 to 500 rupees per share, valuing the business at $2.5 billion. It will be the first time a Tata unit has gone public in two decades.

Another notable offering on the horizon is Softbank-backed electric vehicle maker Ola Electric, which is reportedly preparing to file for an IPO in the coming weeks worth $700 million.

EY projects India continuing to ride the IPO wave until at least the latter half of 2024.

The future of Forest City, a $100 billion development in Malaysia’s Johor state, was hanging in the balance in September as its Chinese owner, Country Garden, sought to negotiate part of its roughly $187 billion debt.

The mixed-use development is the biggest overseas project controlled by Country Garden. With the Beijing real estate giant narrowly missing default in recent weeks, this development of 4,000+ acres was also nearly the biggest overseas casualty of China’s real estate crisis. 

Country Garden reported securing creditor approval to extend a key bond repayment deadline on six out of eight onshore bonds by three years. Part of the reason Country Garden avoided a reckoning is the stimulus measures introduced by the Chinese government to support the real estate sector, which included major Chinese cities relaxing mortgage requirements for some homebuyers.

A stay of execution for Country Garden, which reported a record loss of more than $6 billion for the first half of the year, brings a glimmer of hope for the future of the Forest City project, which relies on future investment for its ongoing development.

Forest City was set up as a 60/40 joint venture between Country Garden and Esplanade Danga 88, a company owned by the Johor state government, and was intended to be part of China’s Belt and Road initiative. With as yet about 9,000 people in homes, the project remains far short of its goal of 700,000 people by the year 2035. The low occupancy is the result of disappointing sales made worse over the course of the pandemic, currency controls, and political opposition to China’s growing influence in the country.

However, the Malaysian government has an interest in seeing the project prosper. At the end of August, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim revealed plans to make Forest City a special financial zone, with incentives including a 15% income tax rate for skilled workers and multiple entry visas.

“The synergy that exists in Johor is different from other states, and [we] can take advantage of Singapore’s achievements,” Ibrahim says. “Among them are the costs that are very high that large companies cannot bear.”    

India’s regulators gave the green light last month to Tata Motors, owner of luxury car brands Jaguar and Land Rover, for an initial public offering of its engineering and research unit, Tata Technologies. The IPO will be the first time that a subsidiary of the Indian conglomerate Tata Group has gone public in 19 years.

The proposed listing comes as Tata Motors is trying to significantly reduce its debt pile. In May, the company revealed that it had already reduced its net automotive debt in India to the lowest level in 15 years, at 62 billion Indian rupees (around $756 million). The IPO, estimated to value Tata Technologies as high as 160 billion rupees.

According to documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Board of India in March, the IPO will consist of an offer for sale of 95.71 million shares in total. Tata Motors, which owns around 75% of the unit, will offer 81.13 million shares, and two other existing shareholders, Alpha TC Holdings and Tata Capital Growth Fund I, will offer 9.72 million and 4.86 million shares, respectively.

The timing is ideal, says Mohit Gulati, founder of technology investment firm ITI Growth Opportunities Fund. As the auto industry focuses increasingly on delivering technology-driven products, companies like Tata Technologies are expected to play a major role in helping original equipment manufacturers differentiate their offerings on dashboards.

“The demand for autos seems robust post-Covid, and I personally see Tata Technology well positioned at the inflection point of capturing this,” Gulati says. “Also, owing to the Tata brand and Jaguar Land Rover legacy, Tata Technology gets a solid seat at every high table of negotiation.”

Despite the intense focus on development in the electric vehicle sector, demand for the IPO is likely to demonstrate that there is still strong demand for innovation within the internal combustion engine space, he adds.

Microsoft Corp. president Brad Smith is expected to meet with UK Chancellor Jeremy Hunt this week to discuss Britain’s decision to block a $69 billion takeover of Activision Blizzard Inc., according to Bloomberg.

Officials from the Competition and Markets Authority first vetoed the deal on April 26, citing concerns that it would suppress competition in cloud gaming.

If the purchase goes ahead, Microsoft will get hold of several iconic video-game franchises, including Call of Duty, Warcraft and Overwatch, expanding the offerings on its Xbox Game Pass cloud gaming service. Critics—including Sony, which owns Xbox’s biggest rival, PlayStation—say the deal is bad for competition.

Not everybody agrees. The EU approved the deal after Microsoft promised that gamers could play Activision titles on rival cloud gaming services for up to 10 years. China had gone a step further with unconditional approval. Regulators in South Africa, Japan, Chile, Brazil and Saudi Arabia have also given the nod.

But even with this degree of international support, the acquisition isn’t a done deal. In the US, where Microsoft just won a private suit brought by gamers seeking to block the transaction, the Federal Trade Commission is still scrutinizing the deal. Meanwhile, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority is standing firm in its decision to block it, making a lengthy appeal process likely.  

According to the UK government’s website, the CMA’s objections remain the biggest obstacle so far. The regulator said,  “The deal would alter the future of the fast-growing cloud gaming market, leading to reduced innovation and less choice for UK gamers over the years to come.” If Microsoft and Activion appeal, a final UK decision is expected by the end of the year. 

Microsoft, of course, has the option of completing the transaction without the CMA’s approval, but that would mean its gaming division would have to withdraw from the UK market or stop offering cloud-gaming services in the country. There is no indication yet that this is the route Microsoft will take.

In any case, this latest wrangling is unlikely to be the last, as regulators, particularly in the US and Britain, increasingly scrutinize multibillion-dollar technology deals. As such, the outcome will likely inform the dynamics of future mergers and acquisitions activity within the tech industry.      

Chinese internet giant Tencent Holdings has helped spark a price war in the cloud services sector with a 40% price cut on service starting in June. It comes as rivals Alibaba Group and China Mobile make similar moves, intensifying the competition in a market already hit by softer corporate demand.

The pricing moves come as China’s economy makes a cautious recovery following the relaxation of strict Covid-19 restrictions. Providers, under pressure to meet sales targets, have used price cuts to tackle sluggish appetite among businesses. 

Alibaba, the current market leader for cloud services in China, said in April that it would reduce prices for certain cloud products by nearly 50%, after it announced a planned IPO for its cloud division. State-owned China Mobile, the second-largest player, also declared cuts of up to 60% for select services, albeit for a limited time in May.

Until recently, the sector saw remarkable growth as increasing digitalization—and growing demand for data storage and processing capabilities—helped fuel a surge in demand for cloud computing power. According to Canalys, a technology market research firm, the Chinese market for cloud infrastructure services in 2021 totaled $27.4 billion, a 45% increase from the previous year.

However, that growth began to cool in 2022, with the Chinese market growing 10% to $30.3 billion, as caution surrounding IT budgets persisted even as Covid-19 restrictions were lifted. As a result, in 2023, Chinese cloud infrastructure services spending is expected to grow by just 12% for the entire year.

The intensifying competition is unlikely to help. With the current price war, existing players like Tencent will likely struggle to maintain profitability as they look to deliver high-quality offerings on much thinner margins. The new market dynamics may even lead to consolidation among smaller players aiming to take advantage of economies of scale through mergers.

There will be long-term effects, too. In a rapidly evolving digital landscape, where cloud services have played a vital role in enabling technological advancements, a price war could shape the future trajectory of China’s tech industry. But, for now, the short- to medium-term winners will be those businesses benefiting from improved affordability of distributed computing power. 

EY, one of the “Big 4 Four” auditors, is postponing plans to split its auditing and consulting units. The firm’s global executive committee remains “committed to creating two world-class organizations that further advance audit quality, independence and client choice.”

Codenamed “Project Everest,” the $600-million plan was originally launched a year ago to address conflict-of-interest concerns related to consultants selling to audit clients. However, internal wrangling and opposition from US executives prevented the project from moving forward.

It’s a significant setback for EY and its attempts to address regulatory concerns over conflicts of interest that have also plagued its “Big Four” rivals—Deloitte, KPMG and PWC. The issue prompted the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to launch an investigation into the industry last year.

The climb down from “Project Everest” came just a week before EY cut 3,000 jobs from its US business, representing 5% of its workforce, citing “overcapacity.” More cost-cutting measures are expected, but EY maintains that they’re industry related and not the result of Project Everest’s failure. After all, KPMG cut 700 US staff in February, while Deloitte just cut 1,200 roles. 

EY’s competitors have rejected any talks of attempting a similar split. In March, Deloitte’s global chief executive Joe Ucuzoglu released a video saying his firm had not only decided against splitting, but that it was “not even a close call.” In January, KPMG CEO William Thomas similarly ruled out any plans of a split.

Nevertheless, even after EY’s recent debacle, the Big Four will be under increasing pressure to address conflicts of interest, and not just from the SEC. In the UK, where three of the Big Four are headquartered, the government—prompted by a slew of accounting scandals—launched plans to revamp the sector and force the firms to shed their auditing divisions.

The state-controlled Saudi Arabian Oil Group, or Saudi Aramco, broke a record last month with its announcement of an eye-watering $161.1 billion net income for 2022: the biggest annual profit of any company, ever. That figure represents a 46.5% increase from the previous year and is around three times the income of the world’s next biggest energy giant, ExxonMobil, which revealed profits of $55.7 billion.

Aramco’s announcement doesn’t make for great optics, however: not least because its windfall was partly the result of soaring energy prices following the outbreak of the Ukraine war, which contributed to much economic hardship elsewhere. Furthermore, the full-year results came just days before the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued fresh warnings of the environmental impact of fossil fuels and the economic imperative of mitigating their effects.

Nevertheless, the record profits are an opportunity for the largest capital spending program in Aramco’s history, estimated at $45 billion to $55 billion, which are to include investments in renewables alongside considerable new oil and gas development.

For Amin Nasser, Aramco’s president and CEO, the “risks of underinvestment in [oil and gas] are real.” Last year, the company devoted $37.6 billion to capital expenditure, 18% more than the year before that. 

The lion’s share of Aramco’s 2022 profits, however, will fall into the hands of the Saudi government, which owns over 98% of the oil giant. Aramco represents a sizeable chunk of Saudi Arabia’s overall oil revenue, which totaled $326 billion in 2022. Much of this money finds its way into the kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund, the Public Investment Fund (PIF). 

The PIF has leveraged its considerable resources, some $620 billion in total assets, to develop sustainable and growth industries, including mining and tourism. The kingdom hopes this will help to move away from dependence on fossil fuels as part of its Vision 2030 development plan. These initiatives include a Green Finance Framework that looks to support green investment and projects like Neom, the planned sustainable “smart city” being built in Saudi Arabia’s northwestern corner.

For now, however, Aramco’s recent performance underscores the kingdom’s continued overwhelming reliance on oil and gas revenue to fund its carbon-neutral ambitions. By Nasser’s own admission, “oil and gas will remain essential for the foreseeable future.”

The Netherlands is the latest country to reveal plans to ban the export of semiconductor technology to China based on national security.

The move is significant because it cuts access to essential chipmaking tools that come from Dutch suppliers and further supports US efforts to limit China’s ability to obtain high-performance semiconductors. Japan is also drawing up similar plans. 

The ban is driven by a concern that China will use the latest chip technology for military applications. This fear has grown in the context of the Ukraine war—where some believe China is already supplying Russian forces with non-lethal equipment.

However, the ban has consequences for semiconductor companies that rely on the global supply chain to produce civilian products. The restrictions introduced by the US via the Chips Act have already imposed limitations on US companies that export to China. According to BNP Paribas, Chinese exports have accounted for 27% of sales at Intel, 31% at Lam Research and 33% at Applied Materials.

Netherlands-based ASML, which makes chipmaking tools, is at the center of this latest ban. ASML is the only producer of the most advanced extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography chip-making machines. 

In a statement, the company notes that it would need to apply for export licenses to ship its most advanced products, but this is only one restriction that ASML has had to navigate.

A ban on the sale of EUV tools to China has been in place since 2019. However, the impact of the latest ban will be limited. ASML adds that measures will not “have a material effect on our financial outlook that we have published for 2023 or for our longer-term scenarios.”

The Chinese government’s reaction was less sanguine. In a press conference, China’s foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said such “bullying acts” violated “market principles and the international trade order.” she added. “They not only harm Chinese companies’ lawful rights and interests but also seriously undermine the stability of the global industrial and supply chains as well as global economic growth.”