The Agricultural Bank of China is close to signing up cornerstone investors, including Temasek and Qatar's sovereign fund, hoping to get a longer-than-normal one-year lock-up for its roughly $20 billion Hong Kong and Shanghai IPO.

Sources involved with the deal said on Thursday that cornerstone investors for AgBank's Hong Kong listed H-share offering are expected to invest between $100 million and $1 billion each.

Interested sovereign funds, which also include Kuwait and China Investment Corp, are in talks to buy up shares worth closer to the $1 billion mark.

AgBank's underwriters are in talks to sign up around 20 cornerstone investors, the sources say, with the final list expected to be wrapped up this weekend. – Reuters