The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc. (Nasdaq:NDAQ) has welcomed 22 companies from China to The NASDAQ Stock Market year- to-date in 2009, including eight IPOs. One of its most recent listings, China Real Estate Information Corporation (Nasdaq:CRIC), debuted on October 16 and is the first IPO spin-off from a Chinese NYSE-listed company to join NASDAQ. Other companies joining NASDAQ included Shanda Games (Nasdaq:GAME) on September 25, one of the largest U.S. IPOs this year and the largest capital raise for a Chinese company in 2009. Additional listings include 13 OTCBB upgrades, and one switch to NASDAQ from NYSE AMEX -- Xidelong.
"China is the largest and most important overseas market for us, with 116 listed companies," said Bob Greifeld, Chief Executive Officer, NASDAQ OMX. "Companies going public in today's market are looking for greater visibility to global investors and seeking better intelligence on investor activity from their exchange. As a result, we are seeing more companies coming to NASDAQ and increased interest in the public company support services we provide."
Eric Landheer, NASDAQ OMX's Head of Asia Pacific added, "We are delighted that NASDAQ OMX has enjoyed such strong performance in China so far this year, with 88 percent of companies seeking a U.S. listing -- and qualifying for both U.S. exchange groups -- choosing NASDAQ. Our primary competitor has lowered their listing standards and we are seeing that companies are attracted to our gold standard listing requirements, which are the highest amongst U.S. exchanges. Our listings pipeline remains strong."
Year-to-date, a total of 17 companies have switched or announced their intent to switch from NYSE to NASDAQ, totaling a global market value of over $33 billion. The switches include renowned brands such as BMC Software, Vodafone Group, Mattel Inc. and DreamWorks Animation. This continues the momentum from 2008 when large companies including News Corporation, CA, The Chicago Mercantile Exchange, and Mylan Labs chose to switch to NASDAQ.
There are currently 116 Chinese listed companies on NASDAQ, including Baidu, NASDAQ's largest listed company in China and a member of the prestigious NASDAQ-100 Index(R). Companies span across all major sectors including technology, media and telecom, consumer, industrials, healthcare, energy & utilities, materials and financials.
NASDAQ OMX has representative offices in Beijing and Hong Kong and has Memorandums of Understanding with the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges as well as Zhejiang, Jiangsu provinces and the Tianjin municipal government.