{"slug": "memory-frenzy-primes-china-champion-cxmt-for-historic-debut", "title": "Memory Frenzy Primes China Champion CXMT for Historic Debut", "summary": "CXMT Corp., formerly ChangXin Memory Technologies, is set to become the biggest China-listed firm on its debut after raising 66.6 billion yuan ($9.8 billion) in a near-record IPO, tapping into investor frenzy over memory chips critical to AI. The retail portion was 212 times oversubscribed, and the IPO price implies a 56% discount to global DRAM peers, fueling expectations of a market value surge above 580 billion yuan.", "body_md": "(Bloomberg) -- Investor excitement over the memory chip trade is setting outsize expectations for the Shanghai debut of CXMT Corp., which is on the brink of making history after a near-record initial public offering.\n\nThe company formerly known as ChangXin Memory Technologies Corp. is poised to become the biggest China-listed firm on its very first day of trading after raising 66.6 billion yuan ($9.8 billion). Valuation multiples, a well oversubscribed IPO and shadow market bets all point in the direction of a debut pop that could boost the company's market value several times above the initial 580 billion yuan.\n\nChina's homegrown champion is tapping into the voracious appetite for the memory chip story, a fulcrum of the global artificial intelligence buildout. As the world's fourth-largest maker of dynamic random-access memory, or DRAM — the chips that underpin everything from smartphones to AI servers — CXMT has emerged as Beijing's best hope of reducing dependence on foreign suppliers in areas including high-bandwidth memory, a critical component for AI data centers.\n\n\"As the undisputed leader in China's substitution story, there will be plenty of funds willing to buy once it pulls back to below 2 trillion yuan in value,\" said Zeng Jiqing, a fund manager at Beijing Nuohua Investment Management Co, adding that he expects the company to take the crown as the most valuable company soon after trading begins.\n\nThe company sold 6.688 billion shares, before an overallotment option, at 8.66 yuan apiece to notch an onshore IPO surpassed only by Agricultural Bank of China Ltd.'s $10 billion share sale in 2010.\n\nThe sequence of sixes and eights — numbers traditionally associated with good fortune and prosperity in Chinese culture — is unlikely to be accidental, underscoring the significance of a listing that has become a symbol of the nation's semiconductor ambitions.\n\nHefei, Anhui-based CXMT is buttressed by retail investor demand, attractive valuations, and renewed signs of state-backed support for markets.\n\nThe retail portion of the IPO was 212 times oversubscribed, with individual investors submitting 9.4 million orders for 7.07 trillion yuan worth of shares — about 10 times the retail order book of SpaceX's world record IPO.\n\nOne reason behind the oversubscription rate is that regulators remain cautious about the valuations at which companies sell new shares to the public, requiring firms to have some comparison against peers in China and globally. Authorities have been known to discourage richly priced IPOs in an attempt to protect individual investors from losses. When markets are buoyant, that can lead to companies getting smaller cash infusions than investors are willing to commit.\n\nSimilar circumstances produced some spectacular first-day performances as a wave of Chinese companies along the AI supply chain raised funds over the past year. Semight Instruments Co. soared a record 876% in April, surpassing the 693% mark set by MetaX Integrated Circuits Shanghai Co. in December. In a similarly watched debut, fellow chipmaker Moore Threads Technology Co. jumped 425% in December.\n\nValuation may provide further appeal for CXMT shares, with investors growing increasingly cautious over AI-inflated multiples. The IPO price implies 2.4 times book value. That's a 56% discount to the average price-to-book ratio for global DRAM peers SK Hynix Inc., Micron Technology Inc. and Nanya Technology Corp., according to Bloomberg Intelligence. It represents an even steeper 77% discount to the average for Chinese chipmakers Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. and Hua Hong Grace Semiconductor Ltd.\n\nTrading on shadow markets also points to buoyant expectations. A perpetual futures contract on the Hyperliquid blockchain tied to its expected share price traded at $6.38 late Friday, about five times more than the offer price to imply a valuation of about $428 billion. Launched by Trade.xyz, the product creates a broader market for views on the deal and offers a real-time gauge of market — a first for an onshore listing.\n\nThat puts CXMT firmly on the path to become the most valuable China-listed company. A gain of roughly 330% would vault it past Industrial and Commercial Bank of China's 2.6 trillion yuan market value for the top spot. Newly issued stocks are not subject to daily trading limits during the first week of their debut on mainland bourses.\n\nTo be sure, semiconductor shares have been volatile in recent weeks as some investors grew concerned that the mega-listing would signal a peak in the AI-driven rally.\n\nBut many investors remain upbeat on CXMT's long-term attractiveness, saying that buying forces may put a floor on the stock even if sentiment for chip names sours elsewhere.\n\n\"Unlike some of the mega IPOs that came before it, CXMT hasn't reached the limits of either its technology or its market share,\" Beijing Nuohua's Zeng said. \"There's still enormous room for growth.\"\n\nA successful listing could also build momentum for other companies in the deal pipeline, including rival Yangtze Memory Technologies Co. and Baidu Inc.'s chip unit Kunlunxin. DeepSeek may file as soon as this year for an IPO, people familiar with the matter have said.\n\nSell side analysts are even more bullish, as they see the company at the intersection of the biggest investment themes of the times: AI and tech self reliance. Huaxi Securities projects a market value of 5 trillion yuan at 40 times 2026 earnings, seeing revenue more than doubling to 572.7 billion yuan by 2028 from an estimated 277.7 billion yuan this year, with net profit climbing to 290 billion yuan.\n\nCXMT may in eligible for stock connect inclusion in time for the third quarter review in late August, taking effect in mid September, at the earliest. Global investors may not have immediate access to the stock upon its listing, though they are also watching the debut with interest.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/memory-frenzy-primes-china-champion-cxmt-for-historic-debut", "canonical_source": "https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/memory-frenzy-primes-china-champion-000000045.html", "published_at": "2026-07-26 00:00:00+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-07-26 09:54:26.124585+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["artificial-intelligence", "ai-chips", "ai-infrastructure", "ai-startups"], "entities": ["CXMT Corp.", "ChangXin Memory Technologies Corp.", "Agricultural Bank of China Ltd.", "SK Hynix Inc.", "Micron Technology Inc.", "Nanya Technology Corp.", "Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp.", "Hua Hong Grace Semiconductor Ltd."], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/memory-frenzy-primes-china-champion-cxmt-for-historic-debut", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/memory-frenzy-primes-china-champion-cxmt-for-historic-debut.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/memory-frenzy-primes-china-champion-cxmt-for-historic-debut.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/memory-frenzy-primes-china-champion-cxmt-for-historic-debut.jsonld"}}