VietNamNet Bridge - Nguyen Van Tuan was appointed the Chair of the Vietnam Construction Bank (VNCB) after the bank was acquired by the central bank for zero Vietnamese dong and its operating model was changed.

Mr. Nguyen Van Tuan.

The State Bank yesterday in HCM City announced the decision to convert the operating form of the VNCB from a commercial bank into a one-member limited liability bank owned by the state.

The Bank for Foreign Trade of Vietnam (Vietcombank) will participate in managing the bank.

Vietcombank’s Deputy General Director Nguyen Van Tuan will be the chair of the VNCB, while two other officials of Vietcombank HCM City will be the deputy general directors. In addition, the State Bank has also appointed many other officials to the bank’s supervisory board.

Tuan is Vietcombank’s deputy director in charge of retail banking. He was sent to Vietnam Construction Bank to help stabilize the situation after VNCB’s officials were arrested.

Speaking at the ceremony yesterday, State Bank Deputy Governor Nguyen Phuoc Thanh said the State Bank bought VNCB for VND0 in order to demonstrate responsibility for the depositors. Thanh also confirmed this is not a form of nationalization.

Meanwhile, according to the Chairman of Vietcombank, Nghiem Xuan Thanh, his bank is involved in the process of restructuring VNCB at the request of the State Bank. Three days ago, Vietcombank presented to the State Bank the restructuring scheme of VNCB and the plan was highly praised. The project will be submitted to the Prime Minister for approval.

VNCB was formerly known as the Trust Bank, with 23 years of operation. When it was restructured and renamed in May 2013, Trust Bank has chartered capital of VND3,000 billion and total assets of more than VND28,000 billion.

The Thien Thanh Group and a number of shareholders contributed capital to restructure Trust Bank and renamed it the Vietnam Construction Bank. Last July, two top leaders of VNCB, Chairman Pham Cong Danh and CEO Phan Thanh Mai, were arrested.

The VNCB shareholders' meeting on January 31, 2015 did not approve the plan to supplement  charter capital to ensure that the real value of the minimum charter capital of the bank be equal to the legal capital. So the State Bank decided to purchase the entire share capital of the bank for VND0.

After this incident, Vietcombank signed a strategic cooperation agreement to support VNCB in terms of liquidity, development of capital, currency trading, credit, trade finance, management, information exchange and provision. The bank also elected Ms. Vu Bach Yen as Chair and Mr. Dam Minh Duc as the CEO.

After the deal, the State Bank became the owner of 100% of the charter capital of VNCB and Vietcombank represents the State Bank to manage and operate VNCB.

S. Tung