China leads world's IPO market in 2016

China led the world IPO market in 2016 despite global uncertainty, according to a report released by consulting firm EY on Monday.

After a steady start to the year on exchanges on the Chinese mainland, with the China Securities Regulatory Commission seeking to quell volatility by keeping a close hold on the pace of new listings, IPO activity steadily quickened in the second half of 2016.

In 2016, the Hong Kong exchange's main board and Growth Enterprise Market (GEM) was the world's leading exchange by capital raised with 19 percent of the global total, ahead of the Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE) with 12 percent.

By volume, the Shenzhen Stock Exchange ranked first with 121 IPOs (11.5 percent of the global total), slightly ahead of Hong Kong (main board and GEM), which ranked second with 117 IPOs (11.1 percent), and also ahead of the SSE in the third place with 104 (9.9 percent).

Chinese exchanges hosted four of the 10 largest IPOs globally by proceeds in 2016, including the largest deal of the year - Postal Savings Bank of China, which raised $7.6 billion on the Hong Kong exchange in September.

The capital markets in China returned to stability this year with the nation's stock exchanges topping the global exchanges in terms of both IPO volume and capital raised, the report said.

Terence Ho, EY Greater China IPO leader, said in a note sent to the Global Times that the launch of the Shenzhen-Hong Kong Stock Connect program would gradually draw greater participation by overseas institutional investors in the A-share market and further boost sentiment in the long run.

The report said that with a strong pipeline of companies ready to list and investor sentiment unaffected by political shock waves elsewhere in the world, China's exchanges are likely to remain the world's most active markets for IPOs in 2017.

The report said the number of IPOs worldwide in 2016 fell 16 percent year-on-year to 1,055 and capital raised declined 33 percent to $132.5 billion.