VietNamNet Bridge – Many banks failed to list shares on the bourse in 2010 due to the gloomy stock market. However, they believe their plans will succeed in 2011.

Military Bank (MB) has caught special attention from the public because its shares are the most popular on the OTC market. In fact, in the second quarter of 2010 MB was approved by the State Bank of Vietnam to list its shares on the HCM City Stock Exchange. However, since the stock market became lackluster in the second half of the year and stock prices sharply decreased, MB decided to delay the listing.

Cao Thi Thuy Nga, Deputy General Director of MB, confirmed that the bank  delayed the listing because market conditions were not good and it was not well prepared for the listing.

“We are once again going to submit a plan to list shares on the bourse in 2011,” she said about the business plan for the new year. “However, if the stock market conditions are not good, we will not list shares at any cost,” she added.

Analysts believe that once MB’s shares hit the bourse they will be hunted by securities investors because the bank has been operating well with a pre-tax profit of over two trillion dong in 2010. Meanwhile, the ROE index (return on equity) was at 30 percent, a relatively high level if compared with the pre-tax profits of the whole banking system.

Dong A Bank also once planned to list its shares on the bourse and          its shareholders agreed that listing is a necessary move to help improve the liquidity of the bank’s shares. However, to date the plan has not been realized. Dong A’s managers said that they really want to list shares on the bourse, but they will only list shares when conditions are favorable.

Nguyen Thieu Quang, Deputy Chair of Techcombank said that right in 2009, the bank decided to list its shares on the stock market. However, the plan has been delayed twice. Quang said he is going to ask for permission from shareholders to restart the plan on listing. It is expected that the final decision will be made by the shareholders’ meeting in March.

“We plan to list on the bourse in 2011 but this will still depend on the stock market performance,” Quang said.

He went on to say, to date the bank still does not have the official figure for  business results. However, he believes that the target profit of 2800 billion dong is reachable.

Regarding the business plan for 2011, Quang said that the board of management is going to submit a plan to get four trillion dong at the shareholders’ meeting.

Techcombank is also well  known as one of the banks with very high growth rates. In 2010 alone, the bank opened 94 new transaction points and employed 2400 new workers.

When talking with local press agencies, most bankers shared the same view that they need to list share on the bourse in order to improve the liquidity of shares, polish the image and improve the competitiveness of their bank.  Banks hope the listing will help mobilize capital to improve their financial capability. However, they stressed that they will not list shares until they can see good conditions on the market.

In 2010, the banking community witnessed one of its members, Habubank, debut on the bourse with the share prices lower than face value. Of course, banks do not want this to happen with them.

Source: Dau tu chung khoan