Consumer electronics and major smartphone maker Xiaomi just officially went public on the Hong Kong stock market starting off at HKD16.60 ($2.12) as opposed to an expected price range between HKD 17-22 and marked a close for the day at $16.80($2.14) giving the company a market cap of $50 Billion, Even when huge is half of the $100 Billion valuation Xiaomi initially aimed for its stock market listing.

Nevertheless, This IPO has seen 5 of its co-founders hit past the Billionaire rank with their stakes in the company amounting to the tune of several Billions of dollars. 

Xiaomi’s CEO Lei Jun who has headed the company since its start 8 years ago commands the lion share and biggest stake in the company with his Xiaomi holding now amounting to over $14 Billion according to Forbes along with other co-founders including Xiaomi President Lin Bin whose stake amounts to a huge $5.3 Billionaires and also other 3 of its co-founders by names of  Hong Feng, Li Wanqiang and Wong Kong Kat whose respective stakes are valued at over $1 Billion each representing a huge success for the company’s co-founders.

This IPO saw Xiaomi raise $4.7 Billion on the stock market and with shares which started trading officially today saw just a 1.2% increase of HKD16.60 to HKD16.80 which represents a not too good perfomance as a 1.2% increase currently stands as the lowest seen since 3 years ago by a $1 Billion+ company for a first day perfomance on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

Xiaomi’s IPO notably comes at a time when a U.S.-China trade war seems to be burgeoning which can be partly blamed for its not so good perfomance on the stock market.

Xiaomi’s IPO notably drew a list of major investors including Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma, Tencent co-founder and CEO Ma Huateng, U.S. Financier George Soros and a series of other major companies including SF Express, Qualcomm and Hillhouse Capital.

Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun also notably got a huge stock award amounting to $1.5 Billion ahead of this IPO which represents one of the largest paydays in corporate history with the huge stock award coming with no-strings attached to the company’s perfomance which seems quite unusual.

We will now get to see how Xiaomi which now bills itself as an Internet Company although it currently makes most of its money from consumer hardware will fare on the stock markets.