Shein plans to reserve at least $400m of stock for cornerstone investors, who receive a guaranteed allocation in return for holding their shares for a fixed period, typically six months.
Separately, the company has approached E Fund Management, Greenwoods Asset Management, and Tiger Global to gauge their interest.
Shein’s pre-listing backers already include Boyu, General Atlantic, and Tiger Global, alongside investors such as Sequoia Capital, HongShan, and Brookfield, according to the company’s draft prospectus reported by CNBC. Most of the potential cornerstone investors are therefore doubling down on a bet they have already placed.
The talks remain fluid, and the final cornerstone lineup has yet to be settled. Shein is targeting to open order-taking on 24 August and to begin trading around 1 September, according to Bloomberg. The company is seeking to raise roughly $2bn and may pursue a valuation of $26bn to $27bn.
Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and JPMorgan are acting as joint sponsors of the listing.
Shein was valued at about $98.2bn in 2022, before slipping to roughly $64bn in a private round completed in 2024. The retreat reflects the pressures that have built around the business, from tariffs and rising costs to regulatory crackdowns and intensifying competition from rivals such as PDD Holdings’ Temu. Founded in China in 2012 and now headquartered in Singapore, Shein turned to Hong Kong after failing to proceed with IPOs in New York and London. It then secured approval from the China Securities Regulatory Commission on 10 July, clearing a key regulatory hurdle.
Existing shareholders are expected to account for as much as half of the offering, says Bloomberg. To ease the transition, the company is weighing a mix of cash payouts and additional free shares for some investors who backed earlier fundraising rounds at higher valuations.
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