Last week, it was announced that there had been an oversubscription for shares in SSAB (Swedish Steel), which is the first company wholly to be privatised.
Still, oversubscription of 657 times is getting out of hand. Price/earnings multiples of shares in Chinese companies are often three times those of Hong Kong equivalents, while disclosure and accounting standards are lower.
The 98% participation rate left only 586,000 unsubscribed shares, and Time Warner said holders who subscribed had sought more than five times that amount in "oversubscription rights."