Ha Noi stock exchange opens
Viet Nam News, March 09, 2005
HA NOI — The Hanoi Securities Trading Center (HASTC), Viet Nam’s second stock exchange, opened yesterday in an event that leaders hope will help Viet Nam’s transition into a market economy.
At the opening ceremony, Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung said the market would be critical to helping the country’s transition and its equitisation of State-owned enterprises (SOEs).
"Stock markets are indispensable for Viet Nam as the country is accelerating its integration into the global economy and privatisation of State-owned enterprises (SOEs)," said Dung.
He added that after the launching of the first stock market in HCM City four years ago, the Government realised that the market offered Viet Nam an effective way to raise capital.
Also addressing the ceremony, Finance Minister Nguyen Sinh Hung said the markets could reduce the country’s dependence on credit and official development assistance funds, and can mobilise more capital from domestic and foreign individual investors and institutes.
State Securities Commission Chairman Tran Xuan Ha said the HASTC, along with the HCM City Securities Trading Center, will organise equity auctions for equitised SOEs in addition to tendering various types of bonds and financial assets.
Ha said the HASTC will also organise secondary markets for unlisted securities, saying that the securities not yet qualified to join the market could register for trading at the HASTC with simpler requirements and procedures.
In contrast to the HCM stock exchange, which uses the centralised auction method for trading, the HASTC will use the trade negotiation method, which is an early model of an over-the-counter (OTC) market, Ha added.
Ha said beginning in June, the Ha Noi stock market will start OTC trading operations for the stocks of unlisted firms.
For the sustainable growth of the country’s stock exchanges, Deputy PM Dung urged the Ministry of Finance and the State Securities Commission to rapidly finalise a legal framework.
Based on the experience of the HCM City stock market, Dung said the HASTC also needs to develop its commodities through the auctions of SOE stocks. Since the July 2000 opening of the stock market in HCM City, trade has developed slowly with only 27 companies listed. Trading has been limited to about US$200,000 per day since the beginning of this year.
However, Dung expected more commodities to be available on the market as the Government’s goes through with its plan to select roughly 100 to 200 of the 2,400 equitised SOEs for listing on the bourse this year. He also expects the State’s plans to restructure more than 1,500 SOEs between now and 2008 to have a positive effect on the markets.
In an effort to boost the efficiency and transparency of the economy, the Government has required SOEs valued at more than VND10 billion ($636,000) to sell shares to the public via the stock market.
Dung also said the SSC should concentrate on training the market’s staff because the exchange remains a foreign concept in Viet Nam.
On its debut yesterday, the Ha Noi stock exchange successfully auctioned 151,800 shares of the Post and Telecommunications Equipment Factory (Postef), which makes equipment for the postal and telecom industry with assets of VND205.5 billion ($13 million).
More than 150 investors registered to buy Postef’s shares, which had ceiling and floor prices of VND350,000 and VND147,500, respectively, against an initial offering price of VND106,000.
HASTC’s director Tran Van Dung said following the recent auctions of Vinamilk and Vifon stocks, Postef’s auction considered successful as the VND163,717 average price of a share of Postef was roughly 1.5 times higher than the initial offering level.
