Chinese cave on the U.S. stock market
Yishui, China (Reuters) – A Chinese tourism company listed in the United States wants investors to pour their money down a dark hole. Literally.
China’s “Underground Grand Canyon,” about an hour’s drive outside the smoggy city of Linyi in the eastern province of Shandong , promises visitors 3 km (2 miles) of grand stalactites, multicoloured lights and an exciting luge ride.
Tracing the attraction’s ticket receipts back to investors in the United States proves an even more complex labyrinth to navigate. Following the trail sheds light on the lengths some Chinese businesses have gone to secure overseas listings, which bring the companies funding and prestige back home.
“For entrepreneurs, going public gives them a sense of recognition. For employees, going public gives them a sense of achievement,” Zhng Shanji, the chairman of the company, boasted to a tourism publication four years ago as he embarked on the odyssey to list it.
The owners of the Underground Grand Canyon attraction eventually used a dizzying array of holding companies to ultimately list in the United States through a reverse merger that accomplished the feat in 2010.
The tourist attraction, located off a small road exiting the millet- and corn-growing village of Yishui in the plains of Shandong, is the brainchild of Zhang, the local magnate who in 2004 leased the cave from Linyi officials for nearly 60 years.
With its rock-shaped ticket booths and brightly lit caverns, the cave tourism business attracted more than 670,000 visitors last year, the company says. By comparison, more than 3.6 million visitors visited Yellowstone National Park, the oldest national park in the United States, that year. (Yellowstone is not listed, nor is the U.S. Grand Canyon in Arizona).
