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Overseas listings by domestic firms are one of the ways for a country to attract foreign capital. China leads the world in the number and value of overseas listings. This paper documents the evolution of Chinese firms’ initial public offerings outside mainland China. We pay special attention to the role of the listing criteria of various exchanges in this evolution. We discuss important reforms of the listing requirements in both mainland and Hong Kong and their effects on the listing location choices by Chinese firms. Finally, we examine the delisting pressure on Chinese stocks from the US exchanges from both the Chinese and US authorities.

China has long adopted the approval system for stock issuance, and the threshold for A-share listing is high, so many companies cannot meet the strict listing requirements for A-shares, while the United States has a developed and open capital market, which has attracted many Chinese companies to list in the United States, forming a group of Chinese stocks listed in the United States. This paper studies the valuation and financing constraint effects of US-listed Chinese stocks and A-share listed companies. The results conclude that the valuation of US-listed Chinese stocks is lower than that of A-share listed companies compared with similar companies listed in A-share, and the financing constraints of US-listed Chinese stocks have not been eased. This paper enriches the research related to overseas listing and provides policy recommendations for overseas-listed Chinese companies and further improvement of the Chinese capital market.