Working Meeting of 2nd STAR Market Self-Regulatory Committee Proposes Initiative on Further Regulating STAR IPO Charges of Intermediaries

The 2nd working meeting of the 2nd IPO Self-Regulatory Committee of the Shanghai Stock Exchange STAR Market (the “Self-Regulatory Committee” for short), held recently, focused on the charges of the IPO intermediaries on the STAR Market, and proposed an initiative for the industry on further regulating the charges collected by the intermediaries.

The Self-Regulatory Committee agreed upon deliberation that for the purpose of better bolstering the companies’ development and financing through listing, on the basis of ensuring the quality of practice, the intermediaries had room for improving their support and service in terms of promoting reasonable charges and reducing financing costs for the enterprises. To this end, the Self-Regulatory Committee issued an industry initiative. First, the intermediaries were urged to regulate the charging operations, better serve the high-quality development of the real economy, and earnestly assume social responsibilities. Second, the sponsorship and underwriting institutions were urged to strictly abide by relevant laws, regulations and industry norms. After comprehensively considering the factors such as service content and quality, business complexity, companies’ affordability, risks and responsibilities assumed, and level of local economic development, these institutions need to further improve the system of charging management, and reasonably work out service expenditures and standardize service charges in the principles of openness, fairness, honesty and credibility. Third, the accounting firms, law firms, assets appraisal institutions and other securities service institutions were encouraged to further provide high-quality and convenient professional services, properly control service costs, enhance services, and regulate the charging standards.

The SSE recognizes and supports the industry initiative made by the Self-Regulatory Committee, and calls on all market participants to follow the above-mentioned industry initiative, so as to contribute to the further stable development of the STAR Market. The SSE will pay attention to the compliance of intermediaries with the industry initiative in its daily supervision, especially to cases where the charges for the sponsorship and underwriting business are higher than the normal levels in the industry, and timely report relevant cases to the Securities Association of China.