Chinese social media company Xiaohongshu — better known internationally as RedNote — is taking steps toward a public stock offering in Hong Kong, according to two sources familiar with the situation.
The Shanghai-based company has brought on Goldman Sachs and CICC among the banks tapped to assist with the potential initial public offering, the sources said. The exact size of the offering and the company’s expected market value have not been disclosed, though two separate sources indicated that Xiaohongshu was trading at valuations as high as $50 billion in private markets toward the end of last year.
Those same sources said the company could make its market debut as early as the latter half of 2025. All sources spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.
Xiaohongshu, whose name translates to “little red book” in English, did not respond to requests for comment. Goldman Sachs declined to comment, and CICC had not responded by the time of publication.
Bloomberg was first to report the IPO plans on Monday, noting that the company was preparing to confidentially file for the Hong Kong listing before the end of June.
Launched in 2013, Xiaohongshu functions similarly to Meta’s Instagram, giving users a platform to share photos, videos, and written posts about their daily lives. In recent years, it has also emerged as a go-to search tool for young people seeking travel advice, lifestyle tips, and dining recommendations. The platform now boasts more than 400 million monthly active users as of 2025.
One source said the company’s projected profit for 2026 could reach $3 billion.
This is not the company’s first attempt at going public. Back in 2021, Xiaohongshu quietly filed paperwork for a U.S. stock listing, but that effort fell apart after Chinese regulators raised objections about the chosen listing location, according to one source and a fifth person with knowledge of the plans.
That same year, Beijing tightened its oversight of private media and internet companies amid rising tensions between China and the United States, and increased scrutiny of Chinese firms listed on foreign exchanges.
The Hong Kong IPO still requires approval from China’s securities regulator, a process that sources say could take several months.
The company’s valuation has fluctuated significantly in recent years — reaching $20 billion during a 2021 funding round before falling to a reported $17 billion in 2024. Interest in the company surged again in early 2025 after large numbers of TikTok users in the United States migrated to its platform, spurred by the prospect of a U.S. government ban on TikTok in January.
