In a sign of the country's increasing importance in the capital markets, a Chinese bank sits atop the global initial public offering league tables for the first time.

Chinese bank China International Capital Corp (CICC) is top of the league tables for the first nine months of the year published today by research provider Dealogic. The bank has sold $8.3bn (€5.7bn) worth of shares. To underline the point, Chinese rival CITIC Securities ranked second with $4.4bn of issuance, just pipping Wall Street bank Morgan Stanley to that spot, who completed the top three with $4.2bn of deals to its name.