Funds managed by Dragon Capital have just sold 500,000 shares of Hoa Phat Group (HPG), reducing its ownership to 106.08 million shares or 4.986 per cent of outstanding HPG shares.

Dragon Capital is reducing interest in Hoa Phat due to its poor prospects

According to HSX, after reducing its ownership to less than 5 per cent, funds managed by Dragon Capital are no longer a large shareholder of HPG since March 14, 2019.

As reported by Vietnam Enterprise Investment Limited (VEIL) on March 7, the largest fund managed by Dragon Capital with the scale of $1.5 billion held 69.15 million HPG shares, equal to 4.61 per cent.

Recently, HPG shares fell sharply due to declining business results in the fourth quarter of 2018 and the company’s plan for 2019 were quite reserved. Specifically, in the last quarter of 2018, HPG’s after-tax profit only reached VND1.76 trillion ($77 million), down about 27 per cent compared to the nearly VND2.4 trillion ($104.35 million) in the same period last year.

This is also the first time since the third quarter of 2017 that HPG’s profit dropped below VND2 trillion ($86.96 million).

In 2019, Hoa Phat set a revenue target of VND70 trillion ($3.04 billion), up 24 per cent, but after-tax profit dropped by 22 per cent to VND6.7 trillion ($291 million).

HPG's cautious targets for 2019 may come from concerns that steel prices will be lower than last year. Besides, China has abolished export tax on square steel billets since the first day of 2019 with the aim of promoting exports, which has been affecting global prices.

On the stock exchange, HPG shares went from the peak of VND48,000 ($2.08) per share in March 2018 (adjusted price) to sometimes stay at VND27,000 ($1.17) in early February 2019. Currently, HPG’s shares are around VND32,000 ($1.39).

VIR