Hong Kong-listed China Construction Bank (CCB) is considering listing on the mainland stock market but has not decided on the timing, said bank vice president Fan Yifei.

CCB, the country's third largest commercial bank and one of the "Big Four" state banks, intends to return because its major business outlets and clients are on the mainland, but "when and in what form is still under discussion", said Fan.

"Fan appears to think that Chinese Depository Receipts (CDRs) are preferable to yuan-denominated A-shares," the China Securities Journal commented. An overseas-listed company can use CDRs to list publicly-traded shares on a mainland stock exchange.

Fan said "CDRs link the bank's domestic market with its overseas market more effectively and avoid the problem of different pricing for A-shares and H-shares, or shares traded in Hong Kong".

But "it is ultimately up to the shareholders" to decide whether the bank will opt to issue CDRs or A-shares, said Fan.

"Issuing CDRs will be time consuming because the Chinese mainland currently has no basic legal framework for CDRs", said the report.

At the end of last year CCB completed its acquisition of a 100 percent stake in the Bank of America (Asia) Ltd., a subsidiary of the Bank of America in Hong Kong, for 9.71 billion Hong Kong dollars, renaming it China Construction Bank (Asia) Corp. Ltd.
With its Hong Kong branches and CCB (Asia) Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary of CCB established at the time of CCB's listing in Hong Kong in 2005, CCB now has three platforms in Hong Kong.

"There is little doubt that the bank's Hong Kong structure will be simplified at some point", said Fan.

But no specific scheme has so far been drawn up to deal with CCB (Asia) Ltd., said Fan, adding that CCB's Hong Kong branches focus on corporate banking and the new CCB (Asia) Corp. Ltd. will continue to focus on retail business.

CCB (Asia) Corp Ltd., which has 14 branches in Hong Kong and three in Macao, plans to open 14 new outlets and employ another 300 people over the next three years, said Qian Naiji, the new bank's chief executive officer.

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