Xinhuanet debuts on Shanghai Stock Exchange

BEIJING -- Xinhuanet Co., Ltd. debuted on the Shanghai Stock Exchange on Friday with its shares surging to a trade suspension immediately after opening.

Xinhuanet.com, the website of China's official news wire Xinhua News Agency, rose 43.99 percent to 39.87 yuan ($5.88) per share, boosted by huge orders on the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

A total of 51.9 million shares became available on the market after the IPO, accounting for a quarter of the company's total capitalization.

Xinhua News Agency holds more than 80 percent of the shares.

According to the company's prospectus, it plans to use the funds raised to expand its multi-media business, cloud services, mobile Internet services, and online education.

Xinhuanet will continue to integrate technology, capital and talent into its media business in the future to speed up the drive toward a world-class Internet culture company, Xinhuanet chairman Tian Shubin said.

Thanks to the rapidly-growing business in information services and mobile networks, Xinhuanet has witnessed rising net profits in the past three years, from 167 million yuan in 2013 to 261 million yuan last year. In the first half of 2016, net profits stood at 102 million yuan.

The website generally ranks about 70th globally in terms of annual traffic data, according to Alexa Internet, a California-based Internet information provider. Its highest ever daily ranking was 25th.

The news website got the green light for the IPO a month ago after years of waiting.

It initially applied for an IPO in early 2013, but the procedure was suspended as the CSRC halted approval of new stock listings. Another application was submitted in mid-2014 after the approval process resumed.

Xinhuanet is the second state media outlet to go public. People.cn, the website of the People's Daily, listed in early 2012.