Rongsheng raises $1.8 billion

Chinese shipbuilder Rongsheng Heavy Industries has raised $1.8 billion in an IPO.

Financial wire services report that China Rongsheng Heavy Industries Group Holdings Ltd. priced its much awaited Hong Kong initial public offering at HK$8.00 per share and sold 1.75 billion shares.

Rongsheng plans to start trading on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on November 19 with the ticker number 1101.

Shanghai- based Rongsheng has shipyards in China’s Jiangsu Province and Anhui Province.

According to the IPO prospectus, the company had revenues of 8.17 billion yuan in the first eight months of 2010, up from 4.82 billion yuan in the same period a year earlier and as of September 30, 2010 had received orders for building 84 vessels of a combined 15.1 million deadweight tons, the prospectus showed.