Beijing Stock Exchange inquiry-based issuance heats up with rising expectations, China Science and Technology Instrument becomes the top favorite

Our Daily News Reporter｜Wang Haimin    Our Daily News Editor｜Peng Shui Ping

Over the past three years, more than 100 new stocks have listed on the Beijing Stock Exchange (BSE), and all of them have completed their issuance by means of direct pricing. However, this situation may be about to change.

A reporter from Our Daily News has noticed that there has been a strong buzz in the market recently about the likelihood that Sinocera Instrumentation might adopt a book-building (offline inquiry) issuance for its BSE listing. The reasons cited include the company’s standout growth in recent years and the presence of independently controllable themes.

Some believe that if the BSE’s new-stock issuances continue to use direct pricing, it may not be fair to those high-quality new stocks. Since last year, some relatively high-quality BSE new stocks have been listed, and their share prices in the secondary market have remained at more than 10 times the issue price for a long time, suggesting that the related pricing mechanism may not be fully reasonable.

However, during interviews, some industry insiders also believe that it is an inevitable trend for the BSE to resume inquiry-based (book-building) issuance after a pause, but that restarting book-building at the current point in time may not be the best timing.

In response to the above market concerns, staff members of Sinocera Instrumentation said that it is currently not convenient to disclose the specific issuance method, and that relevant announcements should be consulted in due course.

Could the first BSE new stock after the resumption of book-building issuance be about to emerge?

Based on what the reporter has observed, recently, there have been many views in the market suggesting that Sinocera Instrumentation, a soon-to-list BSE issuer, may land on the BSE through book-building issuance. Some BSE industry insiders interviewed also hold similar views.

According to the prospectus, Sinocera Instrumentation’s fundamentals have typical “hard technology” characteristics. The company is a leading provider of core components for semiconductor manufacturing equipment in China and a supplier of vacuum science instrument equipment. Its innovation features are mainly reflected in the following areas:

First, the company is the domestic dry vacuum pump manufacturer with the largest shipment volume in the integrated circuit sector, and it is also the only domestic company that has achieved mass applications in advanced process nodes, and the only one that covers clean / medium / harsh full process conditions.

Second, in the field of dry vacuum pumps, the company’s R&D innovations have broken the long-standing oligopoly of European and American and Japanese companies. Dry vacuum pump products meet the production needs of storage processes such as 14nm advanced logic chips and 3D NAND with 128 layers and above. They have already achieved large-scale applications across China’s leading wafer manufacturing companies.

In addition, as a company under the Chinese Academy of Sciences, it has three national-level R&D platforms, such as the National Engineering Research Center for Vacuum Technology Equipment.

Moreover, the company’s operating performance has continued to grow in recent years. From 2021 to 2025, the net profit attributable to shareholders increased from 0.65 billion yuan to 8.4 billion yuan, with a compound annual growth rate of nearly 90%. In the first quarter of 2026, the company’s performance surged again.

It is worth noting that, judging from Sinocera Instrumentation’s IPO process, some aspects seem to be different:

1. For this IPO, the company chose the BSE’s fourth listing standard. This is also the first time since June 2023 that a BSE new stock has adopted the fourth standard (expected market value not less than 1.5 billion yuan, with total R&D spending over the past two years not less than 50 million yuan).

2. On January 16 of this year, the BSE Listing Committee held the 4th deliberation meeting for 2026, where it approved Sinocera Instrumentation’s listing application, and it was registered with the CSRC on February 10. Meanwhile, issuers such as Saiying Electronics that completed IPO registration at the same time have recently already completed their issuance.

Image source: BSE official website screenshot

However, some industry insiders believe that these developments are only basic facts and are not sufficient conditions for restarting book-building issuance.

Liu Zimu, founder of Zimu Research, believes that BSE pricing issuance may not be very fair to high-quality companies due to lower valuations. For instance, BSE new stocks that completed their IPO last year, such as Xingtu Measurement & Control and Hengdong Optics, saw their secondary-market share prices remain at more than 10 times the issue price for a long time after listing, indicating that these companies may not be suitable for pricing issuance and should use book-building issuance.

It is worth noting that, this year, the issuance cadence of BSE new stocks has clearly accelerated compared with 2024 and 2025. According to data from Choice, in the first quarter of 2026, 16 BSE new stocks have already been listed. Based on this pace, the number of issuances for the full year may be far higher than in 2024 and 2025 (the numbers of new stocks listed for the whole year were 23 and 26, respectively).

In response to the market’s buzz mentioned above, the reporter recently called Sinocera Instrumentation. Company staff said that it is not convenient to disclose the specific issuance method; investors should pay attention to the relevant announcements at the appropriate time.

Industry debate over the timing for restarting book-building issuance

From public information, since Yinuowei completed its IPO on the BSE in April 2023, there has been no change in the BSE’s new-stock pricing methods for the following three years.

At that time, Yinuowei used book-building issuance in the offline phase during its IPO. Meanwhile, there were controversies and rumors in the market about Yinuowei’s issuance.

In fact, over the nearly three years after Yinuowei’s IPO, more than 100 new stocks have listed on the BSE, and all of them have used issuance methods of direct pricing. The PE ratio at issuance is usually set around 15x. If the book-building issuance pricing method is restarted, there is likely room for the issuance PE ratio to be opened up.

However, in recent interviews, some BSE industry insiders took a wait-and-see stance on news that book-building issuance is about to resume. Zhou Yunnan, a senior commentator on the National SME Equities Transfer System (New Third Board), said, “This is still just a market rumor for now. As for which company will restart book-building issuance and when, it still depends on the company’s formal announcement.”

An analyst at a certain securities firm who covers the BSE said, “It is an inevitable trend for the BSE to resume book-building issuance after that, but restarting book-building now may not be the optimal timing. First, the BSE market is currently in a declining phase. Second, this year’s issuance cadence for BSE new stocks is faster. In addition, there is controversy around Sinocera Instrumentation, because its non-recurring gains and losses are large, and its gross profit margin is on the low side.”

According to Sinocera Instrumentation’s 2025 annual report, although the company’s net profit attributable to shareholders last year was as high as 0.84 billion yuan, it included 0.74 billion yuan of non-recurring gains and losses. This amount of more than 0.7 billion yuan of non-recurring gains and losses mainly came from fair value change gains/losses arising from financial assets and financial liabilities held by the company. Based on the information disclosed in the prospectus, the company’s fair value change gains last year totaled 65M yuan, mainly driven by the surge in the stock price of a listed company—TuoJing Technology—held by the company.

Image source: Sinocera Instrumentation’s 2025 annual report screenshot

From the perspective of net profit attributable to shareholders excluding non-recurring items, Sinocera Instrumentation’s performance compound annual growth rate from 2022 to 2025 was only 18.4%.

In addition, in recent years, the match between the company’s cash flows and its profits has not been strong. In some reporting periods, there were significant differences between its net profit attributable to shareholders and the net cash flow from operating activities, which to a certain extent reflects that the “quality/realness” of its profitability may still need to be improved.

In fact, although both book-building issuance and pricing issuance, as well as competitive bidding issuance, are recognized IPO pricing methods for the BSE, since the BSE officially opened for business in November 2021, a total of only five BSE new stocks have used book-building issuance, accounting for less than 3%. In this regard, some industry views suggest that the high proportion of direct pricing for BSE new stocks is because direct pricing is more efficient and better fits the characteristics of BSE’s small and mid-sized enterprises.

In the view of the above-mentioned analyst, “Personally, I think it’s not too late to restart book-building issuance once these conditions are met. First, the market is in a stable phase. Second, the issuance cadence for new stocks is not that fast. Finally, the industry track of the IPO company is good, and there isn’t much major controversy.”

“Also, you can’t just do book-building for the sake of doing book-building. Some relatively high-quality companies previously also had their issue prices compressed somewhat (because of pricing issuance), but they still rose a lot in the secondary market, and the companies didn’t really complain. If you truly do book-building, the company might end up oversubscribed, but there’s a risk of post-listing underperformance,” he further pointed out, “The core is still to enhance the market’s appeal to investors. Just like right now when the BSE is offering stock subscription for a new issue, it doesn’t invite anyone—only because there’s a profitable effect. Having 700 billion yuan to 1 trillion yuan frozen capital is also a normal thing.”

Cover image source: Our Daily News media database