CHINA Unicom Ltd., the mainland's No. 2 cellular firm, yesterday denied that its parent firm plans to abandon a stock offering on the domestic A share market.

　　"We won't give up the A share listing. We definitely will go ahead with it," said China Unicom spokeswoman Sophia Tso.

　　Hong Kong's Sing Tao Daily newspaper, citing a mainland newspaper report, said yesterday that China United Telecommunications may give up its plan to offer five billion A shares in China if it cannot raise as much money as hoped for.

　　The parent company has previously said it hoped to raise just under 20 billion yuan (US$2.415 billion) from the offering. But industry sources and analysts said last week that the group is likely to gross only 10-15 billion yuan because of poor market conditions. (SD-Agencies)