Xiaohongshu responded that the company has no plans to go public at the moment
Recently, according to Bloomberg, Xiaohongshu (or Little Red Book) is projected to achieve a net profit of approximately USD 500 million in 2023, surpassing the initial expectation of USD 50 million. It is speculated that Xiaohongshu may go public in Hong Kong as early as the second half of 2024.
In response to this, Xiaohongshu stated that the company maintains regular communication with relevant stakeholders but currently has no specific IPO plans.
An investor close to Xiaohongshu reportedly stated that the company plans to conduct another round of financing before initiating the IPO, which would most likely be a crossover round, with the aim of closing the financing by the first half of next year.
According to insiders cited by foreign media, Xiaohongshu's IPO could potentially raise up to USD 1 billion, depending on market conditions. They also added that discussions are still ongoing, and details such as the fundraising scale and timing may change.
According to data from Tianyancha, Xiaohongshu has already completed six rounds of financing. The most recent round took place in November 2021, raising USD 500 million from investors including Alibaba and Tencent. It was reported by foreign media that Xiaohongshu sought a valuation of approximately USD 6 billion in a previous financing round.
In July, foreign media reported that one of the reasons for Xiaohongshu's suspension of its U.S. listing was due to the release of a draft amendment to the "Measures for the Security Review of Network Information" by the Cyberspace Administration of China. The amendment clearly states that operators with personal information of over one million users must undergo a security review when seeking overseas listings.
In terms of global expansion, Xiaohongshu has actively ventured into different overseas markets in the past three years, launching separate independent apps for each market. Public information demonstates that for the Japanese market, Xiaohongshu introduced the fashion community app Uniik in February 2021, the camping enthusiasts community app Takib in October 2022, and the beauty community app habU in March 2023. For the Southeast Asian market, Xiaohongshu launched Spark, an app highly similar to its domestic version, in April 2022. For the European and American markets, Xiaohongshu introduced the home sharing community app Catalog in November 2022.
However, none of these apps have made significant breakthroughs. Uniik ceased updating in October 2022, Catalog closed in February 2023 after operating for two months, and Spark has experienced slowed growth since January 2023.