The Agricultural Bank of China (ABC), the country's largest rural lender, accepted online subscriptions to its initial A-share public offering from private investors Tuesday.

About 10.5 billion A-shares were available for online subscription, which ended 3:00 PM Tuesday (Beijing time), the bank said in a statement.

ABC will issue 22.24 billion A-shares in the IPO. If over-allotment, or greenshoe, options are fully exercised, the number of A-shares issued will reach 25.57 billion shares. The A-shares will be listed on the Shanghai stock market.

Each individual investor must apply for at least one lot (1,000 shares) but not more than 10,000 lots (10 million shares) at 2.68 yuan (US$0.39) per share, the upper limit of the price range set by the bank.

The bank will decide on the pricing of its A-share offering and over-allotment options Wednesday. It will announce pricing and and online subscription results Thursday.

If the final IPO price is lower than the upper limit, the price difference and the subscription funds from investors who fail to win an ABC share lot will be returned on Friday.

The offering of ABC's H-shares on Hong Kong Stock Exchange will close on Wednesday. ABC's H-share IPO scale was about 25.41 billion shares, and when the greenshoe mechanism is fully exercised, the number of shares will be about 29.22 billion.

(Xinhua News Agency July 7, 2010)