DeepSeek Engages CITIC Securities for Domestic IPO, Sources Say

Two people knowledgeable about the matter revealed on Sept 9 in Hong Kong/Singapore that Chinese AI startup DeepSeek has brought in CITIC Securities to ready a flotation on Shanghai’s STAR Market, the exchange focused on technology.

The Hangzhou-headquartered company aims to begin the IPO process this year, according to the sources, who requested anonymity because the negotiations remain private.

The selection of CITIC by DeepSeek, previously unreported, signals that the startup is advancing with its listing ambitions. Firms pursuing a mainland China IPO usually hire securities companies to carry out pre-listing guidance prior to filing an official application.

The sources noted that no final decisions have been made regarding the possible sale's schedule, the capital DeepSeek may aim to collect, or the valuation it will target.

Neither DeepSeek nor CITIC Securities replied immediately to inquiries seeking comment.

The talks occur while DeepSeek looks for new funding to support its computing infrastructure, model creation, and efforts to keep and hire skilled staff, as competition heats up among top AI companies in China and the United States.

According to a Reuters report from July, DeepSeek is currently in a financing round that would place its worth at 500 billion yuan, or around $75 billion.

In June, the company secured roughly $7.4 billion with a post-financing valuation exceeding $50 billion, according to investor documents and people familiar with the deal.

Reuters earlier reported that, during that June round, founder Liang Wenfeng committed 20 billion yuan of his own money, while Tencent Holdings put in 10 billion yuan and battery maker CATL added 5 billion yuan, making them the biggest outside shareholders.

Chinese and U.S. AI companies are hurrying to go public.

DeepSeek's listing effort unfolds while competitors in China and internationally pay a similar rush to tap public markets for cash, driven by the escalating expense of AI competition, which calls for significant computing power, data-center infrastructure, and engineering expertise.

Earlier in the year, Chinese large-language-model creators Z.AI and MiniMax each completed IPOs in Hong Kong.

Additionally, Moonshot, an AI startup based in Beijing, has submitted a confidential application for a Hong Kong listing, according to earlier Reuters reporting this month.

Moonshot was assessed at $50 billion in its latest fundraising, a figure trailing both DeepSeek and Z.AI, whose market cap now stands at about $54 billion.

The valuations of these Chinese players are still dramatically lower than what their U.S. counterparts aim for. Anthropic—responsible for Claude and Mythos—might be valued as high as $2 trillion when it lists, according to some investors, while OpenAI could see a value of up to $1 trillion in its planned offering.

That chasm points to a stark difference in revenue, highlighting the difficulty Chinese AI developers face turning highly competitive technology into actual profits.

Reuters reported this month that Anthropic intends to start its IPO in mid-October and finalize the flotation ahead of the November midterm elections.

A separate source indicated that DeepSeek's founder Liang expects the IPO proceeds to finance better incentives for keeping core employees and researchers. The firm has recently seen a number of its people depart to better-capitalized competitors such as ByteDance and Xiaomi.

(The exchange rate was set at 1 U.S. dollar to 6.7072 Chinese yuan renminbi.)