Zeng Yuqun, Chairman of Chinese battery giant CATL, right, bangs a gong to start CATL’s debut trading on the Hong Kong stock exchange on May 20. Shares in Chinese battery giant CATL soared almost 17 percent on its first day of trading Tuesday.
PETER PARKS/AFP via Getty Images
Shares in Chinese battery giant Contemporary Amperex Technology soared almost 17% on their first trading day in Hong Kong as investors brushed off geopolitical concerns to pile onto the largest listing so far in 2025.
The company, widely known as CATL and led by its billionaire Chairman Robin Zeng, saw shares jump to a high of HK$306.60 ($39) Tuesday morning, a significant rise from its offering price of HK$263 per share, which was the maximum price announced by the company for the secondary listing in the Asian financial hub. CATL is already listed in Shenzhen.
CATL raised HK$35.7 billion on Monday by selling 135.6 million shares at that price—an amount more than originally planned due to strong demand, according to a Monday stock exchange filing. The world’s biggest listing so far this year will help CATL fund construction of a battery factory in Hungary.
“Investors in Hong Kong don’t care a lot about the U.S. government blacklist,” Kenny Ng, a Hong Kong-based securities strategist at Everbright Securities International, says by WeChat. “Their only consideration is whether the stock will rise or not.”
Ng was referring to the U.S. Department of Defense’s recent decision to name CATL a “Chinese Military Company” for allegedly aiding the country’s military advances. The labelling carries reputational risks and might discourage American businesses from working with CATL. The company, which supplies global auto brands including Tesla, has denied any involvement with military-related businesses.
About half of the shares were snapped up by cornerstone investors like sovereign wealth fund Kuwait Investment Authority, Shanghai Gaoyi Asset Management and UBS Asset Management, another sign of strong investor demand, according to a Tuesday note by Vincent Sun, a Hong Kong-based senior equity analyst at Morningstar.
The offering price was attractive, according to a May 12 research note from Arun George, an equity analyst who publishes via the Smartkarma research platform. The Hong Kong listing was priced at 16.6 times CATL’s estimated earnings for 2025, which is a discount of 45% compared to other battery makers including LG Energy Solution and Samsung SDI, he wrote in the note.
But Ng cautions that investors might want to take profit soon, as CATL already commands a huge market capitalization of over 1 trillion yuan ($138.7 billion) in Shenzhen, “It is not easy for such a big company to keep rising consecutively,” he says. “Short-term investors can take their profit first.”
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