BEIJING, April 4 (TMTPOST)— Multiple U.S.-listed shares of Chinese companies including e-commerce giant Pinduoduo (Nasdaq: PDD), the leading video sharing website Bilibili (Nasdaq:BILI), China’s Quora Zhihu (NYSE: ZH) surged more than 10% on Monday, the first trading day after China’s top securities regulator forecasted its first amendment to a decade-old rule, which was seemed as a potential key move to reduce Chinese firms’ risks of delisting from the U.S. exchanges.  

Source: Visual China

The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) released a draft rule to solicit public comment on Saturday, aiming to revise Rule to Strengthen Confidentiality and File Management Work for Securities Issuance and Overseas Listings, a regulation launched in 2009. Compared with the original rule, the draft deleted the requirement about the on-site inspection mainly conducted by China’s regulators or relies on inspection results of these domestic regulators, which demonstrates the government’s consistent open attitude to the cross-border audit regulation, and offers a system guarantee for a safe and efficient cross-border regulatory cooperation, according to a Q&A on CSRC website, citing the watchdog’s officials’ explanation. The amendment will provide more clear guidance to make market players convenient for efficiently carrying out their overseas offerings or listings, direct companies to properly protect their secret and sensitive information so as to secure the information security for the country, and help regulators launch cross-border cooperation with their overseas counterparts in a safe and efficient manner to safeguard interests of the global investors, the CSRC officials expected. And they underlined that the regulator firmly supports companies to choose their listing venues of their own will.

CSRC’s move came as the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) nearly a month ago added five Chinese issuers including Yum China to its provisional list, for the first time identifying Chinese listed companies for failing to comply with the Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act (HFCAA), which could lead to these companies’ shares being delisted. This is the U.S. regulator’s standard procedure to implement HFCAA, and whether the companies added to the list will be delisted from U.S. stock market in the coming two years ultimately depends on the progress and result of the auditing cooperation between Chinese and American regulators, head of CSRC’s international department last week said after SEC added five more Chinese firms including Baidu and iQiyi to the list.