Real estate in China drives an IPO boom

SHANGHAI: Shares of Soho China, a Beijing property developer, soared 15 percent Monday on their first day of trading in Hong Kong - the latest hot public stock offering that is creating a new class of Chinese real estate tycoons.

The spectacular debut of Soho, which values the company at $6 billion, comes at a time when stock prices in China are skyrocketing and some of the country's biggest cities are being radically transformed by a huge building boom.

Despite government efforts to curb real estate speculation in China, housing prices continue to rise, fueling even more construction, and also a frenzy of initial public stock offerings by big real estate companies.

Indeed, over the past few years, the IPO boom has already made some individuals worth billions of dollars.

While the United States is in the grips of a subprime mortgage crisis, investors in Chinese real estate are celebrating and pushing the value of housing and housing shares to spectacular heights.