China Shenhua Energy raised 66.58 billion yuan (US$8.9 billion) from its Shanghai initial public offering (IPO), the largest domestic offering yet.

China's largest coal producer said in a statement to the Shanghai Stock Exchange Thursday that it sold the 1.8 billion A shares at 36.99 yuan per piece, the higher end of the price range between 34.99 yuan and 36.99 yuan.

The IPO price represented a discount of 17 percent to its H shares, which closed at 45.80 HK dollars on Tuesday. The Hong Kong stock exchange closed for a holiday on Wednesday.

It translated 44.76 times of the coal producer's 2006 earnings after the share offer, according to the statement.

The IPO size of China Shenhua exceeded that of China Construction Bank (CCB), the country's second largest commercial lender by assets, which raised 58.05 billion yuan from its A share IPO.

The coal firm also set a new record by receiving 2.67 trillion yuan in subscriptions for the share sale, surpassing CCB's 2.26 trillion yuan in mid this month.

Analysts said the investors chased Shenhua shares for almost certain price jump on debut and on expectation of rosy corporate earnings boosted by rising coal prices.

Chinese government has been encouraging the red-chip companies to launch domestic IPOs to increase equities supply in a bid to mop up excess liquidity and help cool the stock market where the key index has more than doubled this year.

The company has said it would use the proceeds to build or upgrade its coal, power and transportation systems and purchase strategic assets.

By the end of this June, it had proven reserves of 5.99 billion metric tons mainly in northern China's Shanxi Province and Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.

(Xinhua News Agency September 27, 2007)