The China Pacific Insurance Co., the country's third largest life insurer, got the green light from the Hong Kong Stock Exchange for its 3.4-billion-U.S.-dollar share float on the bourse.

The company received approval from China Securities Regulatory Commission Wednesday and would list up to 990 million shares in the overseas market, Saturday's China Daily reported.

"The Hong Kong listing will help the company step up its business expansion and compete with bigger domestic rivals like China Life and Ping An," the newspaper quoted Zhao Xinan, a Shanghai-based analyst with Northeast Securities as saying.

The company's shares on the Shanghai bourse declined 4.3 percent to 23.84 yuan (3.49 U.S. dollars) Friday.

"It is understandable that the insurer's A shares danced with the general downtrend of the stock market, as investors have largely priced in the IPO news," Zhao said.

The company, partly owned by American private equity firm Carlyle Group, said in August that it expected to price its H shares at around 23.5 yuan per share and planned to raise around 23.5 billion yuan from the Hong Kong listing, the paper said.

In the first three quarters this year, the company reported a net profit of 4.1 billion yuan, up 4.8 percent from a year earlier. Its revenue fell 1.1 percent year on year to 81.4 billion yuan.

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