Middle East funds score big gains on China AI IPOs

Middle Eastern funds, including Abu Dhabi Investment Authority and Aramco Ventures, have booked sharp gains on newly listed Chinese AI stocks despite wider market jitters tied to conflict in the Gulf.

ADIA’s US$65 million cornerstone stake in MiniMax Group, was worth more than US$400 million after its January listing in Hong Kong.

Aramco Ventures put US$30 million into Knowledge Atlas Technology, known as Zhipu, before its IPO, and that stake was valued at US$415 million after its debut early this year.

The positions are small next to ADIA’s roughly US$1 trillion portfolio and Aramco Ventures’ near US$7 billion in assets, as Gulf investors balance exposure to the US and China amid concerns regional attacks could disrupt critical infrastructure like data centers.

🔗 Source: Bloomberg

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Implications, context, and why it matters.

Behind the Gulf’s gains

Big first-day jumps leaned on heavy retail demand in Hong Kong, which pushed prices higher after listing 1.
MiniMax’s public offering drew more than 1,200 prospective buyers for every HK$1 worth of stock available in the Hong Kong public offer 1.
Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKEX) listing rules like Chapter 18C let certain “specialized and technological” companies list on the HKEX main board even when they are unprofitable or have low revenues, which opens a fundraising route 1.
Several companies turned to IPOs because private venture capital could no longer meet their rising need for cash to pay for AI research and computing power 1.

What the IPO wave says about AI funding

Leading U.S. AI developers like OpenAI and Anthropic remain private, while China has moved earlier to list foundation-model companies (AI developers that build large, general-purpose “base” models) in Hong Kong and provide a clearer look at their finances and funding choices 2.
Sovereign wealth funds such as the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority joined as cornerstone investors (large early IPO investors who commit to buying shares before the stock starts trading), which brings global capital into these Hong Kong-listed Chinese AI offerings 3.
MiniMax disclosed 27.6 million monthly active users and about 1,771,600 paying users in the nine months ended Sept 30, 2025, ahead of listing 4.
The mix of flexible listing pathways and access to global public markets gives other countries a model to study for funding capital-intensive AI work outside Silicon Valley 1.