Company: GDHLF
Filing Date: 2025-05-27
Form Type: 424B5
Source: 0001104659-25-053057
Chunk: 74

Company: GDS Holdings Ltd
Filing Date: 2025-05-27
Form: 424B5
Chunk 74
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 — We adopt different practices as to certain matters as compared with many other companies listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.”

If the PCAOB determines that it is unable to inspect or investigate completely our auditor at any point in the future, our ADSs may be prohibited from trading in the United States under the HFCA Act, as amended, and any such trading prohibition on our ADSs or threat thereof may materially and adversely affect the price of our ADSs and value of your investment.

The HFCA Act was signed into law on December 18, 2020 and amended pursuant to the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2023 on December 29, 2022. Under the HFCA Act and the rules issued by the SEC and the PCAOB thereunder, if we have retained a registered public accounting firm to issue an audit report where the registered public accounting firm has a branch or office that is located in a foreign jurisdiction and the PCAOB has determined that it is unable to inspect or investigate completely because of a position taken by an authority in the foreign jurisdiction, the SEC will identify us as a “covered issuer”, or SEC-identified issuer, shortly after we file with the SEC a report required under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, or the Exchange Act (such as our annual report on Form 20-F) that includes an audit report issued by such accounting firm; and if we were to be identified as an SEC-identified issuer for two consecutive years, the SEC would prohibit our securities (including our shares or ADSs) from being traded on a national securities exchange or in the over-the-counter trading market in the United States.

In December 2021, the PCAOB made its determinations, or the 2021 determinations, pursuant to the HFCA Act that it was unable to inspect or investigate completely registered public accounting firms headquartered in mainland China or Hong Kong including our auditor. After we filed our annual report on Form 20-F for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2021 on April 28, 2022, the SEC conclusively identified us as an SEC-identified issuer on May 26, 2022. As such, we were required to satisfy additional disclosure requirement for SEC-identified issuers that are also foreign issuers in our annual report as of December 31, 2022 and for the year then ended. See “Item 16I. Disclosure Regarding Foreign Jurisdictions that Prevent Inspections” in our 2024 Annual Report.

Following the Statement of Protocol signed between