China-based P2P lender X Financial files for $250M US IPO, says it has booked $270M in revenues in 2017, up 676% YoY
Yimian Wu / China Money Network :
Context & Ripple Effects
X Financial is filing into a US listing window for Chinese consumer fintechs that opened with Qudian's $900M IPO and 22% first-day pop in October 2017, and has since cooled: 360 Finance closed flat on its December 2018 debut after raising just $51M. X Financial's $270M in 2017 revenue, up 676% year over year, is the growth story it is asking US investors to price.
The filing also lands ahead of a queue of compatriots — Beijing-based lender 9F filed for a $150M US IPO in mid-2019, alongside brokerage listings from Futu and Up Fintech — so how X Financial prices will set the reference point for the consumer-lending names behind it.
First-order effects
- If the $250M offering prices, X Financial converts hypergrowth book value into listed equity while US investors gain direct exposure to a Chinese P2P balance sheet whose revenue base was less than $40M two years earlier.
Second-order effects
- With 360 Finance's flat debut as the most recent comparable, underwriters and later filers like 9F must anchor pricing to a discounted multiple rather than Qudian's 2017 pop, compressing what the next wave of Chinese lender IPOs can raise.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds — shrinking raise sizes and weaker debuts across successive Chinese fintech listings — the sector drifts toward consolidation among listed players and a shift of new issuance toward Hong Kong, where Yixin's 2017 debut showed domestic-market appetite.
The trend: Chinese online lenders are racing to list in the US on hypergrowth numbers even as each successive debut performs worse than the last, narrowing the window for the cohort behind them.