Hanoi Stock Exchange (HNX) reported that Lam Thao Superphosphate and Chemicals Co (Lafchemco) earned over 30.42 billion dong from auctioning two million shares at the starting price of 14,000 dong/share.

After the auction finished, there were 60 winners including four institutions and 56 individual investors.

The averaging winning price was recorded at 15,214 dong/share. The highest bidding was two million shares and the lowest order was 500 shares. The highest bidding price was 20,100 dong/share.

Winners can pay to take these shares from November 20 to December 3, 2009.

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The management board of Hanoi general Investment

Joint Stock Co (Hanic) has recently approved for opening a branch in Singapore namely Hanic Singapore Branch (Hanicsi) for operating and managing the import-export works, exporting labourers and doing investment promotion activities.

The company's management board has assigned the steering board for following up the establishment of the branch in December 2009.

Apart from doing business activities in Singaporean markets, the company's new branch will support the company's domestic business department in expanding its business scope to foreign countries, as well as strengthening the company's trademark in international markets.

At present, Hanic has member companies of Hanic general trading centre, Mong Cai Branch and Vietnam Import Export Co Ltd (Vinaex) for exporting and importing works and three labour exporting centres.

Lately, the company has conducted collecting its shareholders' opinions for increasing chartered capital from 87.02 billion dong to 205.93 billion dong in Q1 of 2010.

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After the trading session on November 20, the Vietnam's stock market witnessed a fall after several gains. The trading session today closed with a fall of 4.21 points or 0.75 percent of VN Index to 555.84 pts.

The market liquidity slipped with the total trading volume of over 50.6 million shares worth over 2.5 trillion dong, down 17 percent in volume and 22 percent in value day on day.

Amongst 182 listed shares and four fund certificates on the stock market, the market saw 38 shares increased with 15 reaching the ceiling price, 127 others decreased with seven falling to the floor price and 21 remaining shares stood still at the comparative price.

Some gained the ceiling price such as PVF, PVT, PET, PIT, PGC, ASP, MTG and PVA, PVE, PVC, PVG, PGS, PVG and PLC on the northern floor.

Out of large marker capitalisation shares, only VIC gained 4,000 dong per share to 112,000 dong per share and BVH bounced 100 dong to 31,300 dong per share.

In terms of trading volume SSI led the market with 2.73 million shares and followed by PVT 2.24 million, STB 1.93 million, LCG 1.87 million, PVF 1.68 million and REE with 1.56 million shares being transferred.

The HNX Index today November 20 dropped 0.89 points or 0.48 percent to end at 184.79 pts with the total market trade of over 24.4 million shares valued at over 986 billion dong.

Some big gainers were BTH, CCM, HCT, KMF, MEC, PGS, PLC, PVA, PVC, PVG, PVS. SDN, SDT and TLC.

Shares reached big trading volume including VCG with over 2.3 million shares and then KLS with over 1.5 million shares and PVS and PVX with over 1.4 million and others with less than one million shares being traded.

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SME Securities Joint Stock Co (coded SME) has announced achieving profit after tax in October of 15.166 billion dong, and pre-tax revenue of 19.748 billion dong, up 283.08 percent against the previous month.

In details, the company's revenue from stock brokerage activities was estimated at 5.629 billion dong, increasing 126 percent in comparison with that of September. Especially, the company earned revenue from stock investment

and capital contribution of 13.372 billion dong, counting for 67.7 percent of the whole month. The new accounts being opened at SME Securities in October increased by 12 percent.

The company's progressive revenue up to the end of October 2009 was posted at 55.105 billion dong, surpassing the company's adjusted business plan.

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Between October 14 and November 13, VOF Investment

Ltd already offloaded 230,000 LCG coded shares of Licogi 16 Joint Stock Co., reducing the fund's ownership ratio in LCG down to 1,128,200 shares or 5.53 percent, HOSE reported on November 19.

Also, the fund sold out 300,000 ITC coded shares of Housing Investment Trading Joint Stock Co. from October 30 to November 13, 2009. Thus the number of ITC shares held by VOF Investment Ltd fell to 1,827,500 shares or 7.94 percent.

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Southern bourse-listed Construction Development and Investment Joint Stock Corp (coded DIG)'s board of directors recently passed a plan to offer 30 million shares totalled at 300 billion dong to pay dividend for 2009 at the ratio of 7:3 in Q4.

With issuing 30 million shares, DIG will finalise its chartered capital increase plan to one trillion dong.

Earlier, the company succeeded in retailing 10 million shares to hike chartered capital from 600 billion dong to 700 billion dong.
As planned, these shares will be officially listed on the Hochiminh Stock Exchange (STC) from November 20.

Reportedly, in Jan-Sep, DIG earned over 1.1 trillion dong of revenue, up 165.7 percent year-on-year, 520 billion dong of pre tax profit, rising 79 percent, and the company's after tax profit increased 53.2 percent to 426.5 billion dong.

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Ba Ria-Vung Tau Housing Development Joint Stock

Co (Hodeco - coded HDC) has recently got approval from Ba Ria-Vung Tau province people's committee for investing in two projects of high-class apartment buildings in the centre of Vung Tau City.

The first project is Thi Sach Residential Quarter that has lately been handed over to Hodeco in September 2009 with total value of 62.9 billion dong. The 31-storey apartment building will be built on a site of 3,400 square metres on Thi Sach St, Thang Tam Ward, Vung Tau City.

The second one is Binh Gia Residential Quarter, including a 27-storey apartment building that will be constructed on a site of 3,560 square metres on Binh Gia St, Ward 8, Vung Tau City. This land plot was purchased via an auction in 2007 with the land value of 15.5 billion dong at that time.

At present, Hodeco is in the middle of preparing legal procedures and designing works for the two projects. It's expected that the construction works will start in Q1 of 2010.

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In the statement of Bao Viet Group's shareholders' meeting on retailing shares to its strategic shareholder-HSBC Insurance (Asia-pacific) Holding Limited on November 16, Bao Viet Group plans to issue 53,682,474 shares priced at 35,000 dong/share.

The selling price is defined basing on the closing price of BVH-coded shares at Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (STC) on October 22.

The group expected to earn some nearly 1.9 trillion dong from the share issuance.

After this share issuance, BVH will increase its chartered capital from 5.73 trillion dong to nearly 6.27 trillion dong, of which HSBC holds 18 percent stake.

BVH also said that the capital being raised from the share issuance is to increase finance capacity and competitive capacity and strengthen commitment of strategic shareholder in technology transfer, administration renovation and corporate management.

BVH said that HSBC is the group's unique foreign strategic shareholder with the current holding of 10.318 percent stake.

According to BVH's report, despite of hardships from economy in 2009, during the first nine months this year, the group still announced satisfactory business results with nearly 7.74 trillion dong of revenue and 912 billion dong of combined pre tax

profit.

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Saigon Asset Management Fund Joint Stock Co (coded SAM) and Refrigeration Electrical Engineering Joint Stock Corp (coded REE) plan to sign a strategic cooperation contract for establishing SAM Management Fund Co and RNG, a domestic fund management Co that REE hold the majority of holdings.

These two companies cooperated to establish a foreign investment fund with the total value of $100 million for investing in real estate projects, the private enterprises that prepare for IPO and listed firms.

The two funds of SAM and RNG planned to meet the foreign investors in the US, Europe and Asia in early 2010.

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Song Da Joint Stock Co No 10.1 (coded SNG) announced on November 16 the company's approval for issuing 2.6 million shares in order to increase the chartered capital from 19 billion dong to 45 billion dong, replacing the previous planned increase in chartered capital from 19 billion dong to 30 billion dong.

The company plans to raise its chartered capital to 45 billion dong in two phases. In the first phase, SNG will offer 1.9 million shares for the existing shareholders with the price of 10,000 dong per shares and 95,000 shares to the key members of the company's staff at 15,000 dong per share. In the second phase, the company will offer 605,000 shares for other investors with the price equal to 80 percent of the average price in the previous five consecutive trading session, but no less than 32,000 dong per share.

The company's management board will take responsibility for choosing the share-offering date. It's expected to gain about 39.785 billion dong from this share-issuing period. The company planned to use the money for funding its investment projects as well as supplementing capital in order to re-structure the enterprise's financial system.

In Q4, Song Da 10.1 planned to gain total revenue of 48.2 billion dong and profit of 5 billion dong.

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VNStockNews.com - HCM City Technical Infrastructure Investment Joint Stock Co. (Coded CII) announced to organise the extraordinary shareholder meeting to seek approval to raise its chartered capital from 503 billion dong to nearly 1.129 trillion dong within this year.

CII closed the shareholder list on November 11.

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At the PTSC lower section seaport of Vung Tau province, Petroleum Technical Service Joint Stock Corp (PTSC - coded PVS) successfully launched its 5,000 tonne barge after nine-month construction.

The barge is 90 metres long, 34.6 metres wide and 5.5 metres high. With this, PTSC will be active in transporting petroleum building components to install offshore, reduce transport cost and time.
First off, the barge will be used to carry topside of northeastern Black Lion (Su Tu Den) oilfield.

On the same day, PTSC signed four supply contracts worth nearly $415 million including Chim Sao project with Premier Oil Co, Black Rhinoceros contract with Hoang Long JOC, Topaz contract with Petronas Caligari Vietnam, and the operating and maintenance service supply contract with Cuu Long JOC.

Also, PTSC contracted to provide a FSO-5 supply service to Vietsovpetro for the crude oil mining in White Tiger (Bach Ho) oilfield.

FSO-5 ship costing PTSC's $208 million was built by Vinashin.

As scheduled, the ship will be finished and handed over by next March. With the load of 150,000 tones, this is the highest floating oil storage warehouse in Vietnam at this time.

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VNStockNews.com - Issuing bonds, especially convertible bonds, to mobilise capital is considered a “wise” choice for many banks in the context of cash mobilisation facing difficulties despite continually increased interest rates.

After two years of “silence”, mobilisation of capital through bonds has taken off again with a series of banks launching successful issuances such as the Technical and Commercial Joint Stock Bank of Vietnam (Techcombank) with 2.1 trillion VND worth of bonds issued at a fixed interest rate of 10.5 percent per year and the Military Bank (MB) with 1 trillion VND worth of two-year bonds issued at a fixed interest rate of 10 percent per annum.

According to several banks, bond issuance not only helps enterprises take the initiative in calculating capital mobilisation costs but also supplements medium- and long-term capital sources, thus reducing pressure on banks in setting time-limits on interest rate payments.

In addition, to ensure a roadmap of increasing banks’ chartered capital to 3 trillion VND by late 2010 under the State Bank of Vietnam’s regulations, many banks have also sped up the issuance of convertible bonds.

Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) has offered 1 million convertible bonds to its shareholders with a conversion ratio of 1:110.5.

The Saigon-Hanoi Commercial Bank (SHB) has received approval to issue convertible bonds worth 1.5 trillion VND in total for its existing shareholders and strategic partners. After one year, these bonds will be converted into shares at a ratio of 10 shares to one bond.

According to Duong Thu Huong, General Secretary of the Vietnam Banking Association, with high interest rates and the possibility of conversion, such bonds bring attractive benefits to their owners. “This is a wise choice for many banks because the method does not reduce the value of banks’ shares but still mobilises capital from shareholders,” she said.

However, according to Do Ngoc Quynh, General Secretary of the Vietnam Bond Market Association, because bank bond interest rates are controlled by the ceiling interest rate, the issuance of bonds is more difficult than that of shares.

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VNStockNews.com - Hoa Sen Group (HSG) earned VND285.47 billion (US$15.6 million) in October and posted a net profit for the month of VND55 billion ($3 million), exceeding the month’s target by 27 per cent.

The company targets VND520 billion ($28.4 million) in net profits for the fiscal year of 2009-10. Hoa Sen deals in steel, building materials, real estate development, financial investments and marine logistics.

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VNStockNews.com - Shareholders of Huu Lien Asia Joint Stock Co (HLA), a manufacturer of steel pipes and machinery parts, have approved a plan to pay an 8 per cent cash dividend and issue bonus shares to existing shareholders at a ratio of 20 shares per hundred.

HLA will also issue 10 million additional shares to its major shareholders.

The company earned VND1.88 trillion (US$102.7 million) and posted a net profit of VND66.7 billion ($3.6 million) in the first nine months of this year.

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VNStockNews.com - Local lenders are finding their high interest rates unable to attract deposits as investors divert funds to the more profitable stock and real estate markets.

The central bank said in a weekly review late last week that many lenders had increased rates by 0.03-0.3 percentage points on dong deposits and by 0.1-0.3 percentage points on dollar deposits.

Some banks in Vietnam are offering 10.3 percent a year on deposits, nearing the 10.5 percent rate cap. Still, bankers say its been difficult to attract and retain depositors.

A senior official at Vietnam Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Industry and Trade, or Vietinbank, said local lenders had already raised their interest rates to the highest levesl possible.

“Right now lending and deposit rates at our bank are the same. How can we increase deposit rates any further?”

Deposits at Vietinbank barely expanded last month. Meanwhile, Vietcombank said savings from individual customers had declined since the end of October.

Phan Dao Vu, general director of Bao Viet Bank, said that other investment options must be pulling money away from banks as deposit rates at all commercial lenders were similarly high.

Duong Thu Huong, general secretary of the Vietnam Banks Association, said that real interest rates at commercial banks were high, discounting inflation, but they were still less attractive than the profits that real estate and stocks can generate.

A deputy director at a bank in Ho Chi Minh City, who wanted to be unnamed, told Thanh Nien that the highest deposit rates were now at 10 percent a year while other investment options like stocks, gold or property could promise the same income in just a few days.

Trading volume on the stock market used to be around VND1 trillion, but the figure has increased to as high as VND9 trillion recently. The money that went into the market was definitely withdrawn from bank deposits, said the director.

State Bank Governor Nguyen Van Giau was quoted by the Vietnam Economic Times Monday as saying there was pressure on local lenders to generate more funds for the government’s loan subsidy program.

“Under the program, local banks are not allowed to reject loans to businesses as long as they are eligible for the interest rates subsidies,” Giau said.

The situation is now difficult for both lenders and the central bank, the governor said.

The dilemma is that interest rates need to be kept unchanged or be lowered to boost the economy, but at the same time rates should be raised to help lenders attract more funds, he said.

The central bank has said it would maintain its benchmark interest rate at 7 percent until early 2010.

Under a loan subsidy scheme planned for next year, the government will continue to cover 2 percentage points of the interest rates on new loans to eligible businesses, down from 4 percentage points this year.

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VNStockNews.com - Vietnam's property developer Vincom Joint Stock Co. (VCI) plans to sell $100 million of five year convertible bonds, a source briefed on the plan said on Monday.

The bonds are being marketed to investors at a yield of 5-6%, the source told Reuters, adding Credit Suisse is handing the deal. These bonds will be listed on the Singapore Exchange.

Vincom operates luxury resorts, shopping malls and high-end condominium projects in Hanoi, Danang, Nha Trang and Ho Chi Minh City.

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VNStockNews.com - Foreign investors were net buyers of VND2.38 billion ($133,800) of Vietnamese stocks out of a total VND2.34 trillion traded Monday, the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange said.

Volume traded totaled 48 million shares, with foreigners accounting for 4.8% of that amount, the stock market operator said.

In the month to date, foreign investors have been net buyers of VND98.2 billion of Vietnamese stocks. (Dow Jones)

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VNStockNews.com - Indochina Capital Vietnam Holdings Limited (ICV.LN) said Monday from July 31 to September 30 it made a pretax profit of $12.9 million. MAIN FACTS:

-Net gain on investments $17.8 million.

-Since June 30, NAV per share grew 5.3% to $5.61 at Sep. 30.

-VN Index closed 29.5% higher than previous quarter.

-Substantial underperformance of fund's NAV against VN Index was primarily result of asset class allocation, driven by shareholders' decision to put fund on liquidation footing. (Dow Jones)

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VNStockNews.com - Apec Securities Joint Stock Co (APS) has recently reported business results in Jan-October with 19.4 billion dong of after tax profit, or 97% of this year's adjusted plan.

In October alone, the company earned nine billion dong of after tax profit.

As planned, APS will officially list shares on Hanoi Stock Exchange (HNX) in next Q1.

In October, the total trading volume of APS-coded shares reached 4.16 million shares on UPCoM floor, accounting for 46.83 percent of the market's total trading volume, averaging nearly 200,000 shares per session.

At present, APS's market share for securities brokerage sector accounts for some 2 percent.

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VNStockNews.com - There will be more plants and works being built and many jobs will be created as a result when joint stock banks succeed in raising capital via securities issue. The equitisation process is being restarted up when IPOs were reported with good performance.

Previously, the capital mobilisation stood still from 2008 because of the stock market slump and a lot of projects had to be delayed due to the standstill of share issues.

Meanwhile, the equitisation seemed to be brisker, On November 9, nearly 6.8 million shares of Red River (Song Hong) Corp were sold out successfully with the average winning price of 22,290 dong/share against the highest bidding price of 29,900 dong/share, higher over two times than the starting price.

Nguyen Ho Nam, general director of Sacombank Securities Co (SBS) expressed his high expectation in the firm's upcoming IPO that is scheduled on November 28, 2009 when the bidding volume was higher three times than the offering volume. Apart from 17.6 million shares being auctioned at the initial price of 15,000 dong per share, 11 million shares of SBS will be sold to strategic partners.

Earlier, since the first half of October on both Hanoi and HCM City stock bourses, IPOs have been more exciting. Van Dien Fused Magnesium Phosphate Fertiliser Joint Stock Co established a new record when the investors' bidding volume was higher over six times than offering. Some other IPOs of Lam Thao Superphosphate and Chemical Co, Vidamo Petrochemical One Member Ltd Co also reached good results.

Listed companies met more advantages as raising capital. DIG Construction Investment and Development Corp finished the selling of 10 million odd shares to 25 investors with the raised sum of money of more than 100 billion dong. HCM City Transforwarding Warehousing Corp (Transimex-TMS) after raising 31.5 billion dong continued launching the second phase sales of 2.1 million shares to mobilise extra 31.5 billion dong, bringing total raised money amount to 63 billion dong via both phases.

According to Transimex, some 63 billion dong will be invested in ICD Transimex depot centre project whereby the company's container depot area will be increased by 20 percent and the service developing capacity of ICD Transimex will surge by 50 percent from the current figure.

Before Transimex, Hoa Sen Group Joint Stock Co (HSG) announced the plan of offering nearly 12 million shares to strategic investors at a price of no less than 60,000 dong/share and one million shares to the company's employees to raise capital for Hoa Sen Phu My tole factory in Phu My I Industrial Zone, Tan Thanh Dist, Ba Ria Vung Tau province. As stated by HSG's chair Le Phuoc Vu, the investing in projects in this period will help the company reduce production costs and expand consumption market.

Similarly, other listed firms took advantages of the recovery of stock market to boost capital mobilisation for projects. Ba Ria Vung Tau Housing Development JSC (HDC) sold nearly two million shares at 20,000 dong/share, Lam Dong Food JSC offered shares to shareholders at 18,000 dong/share. Vietcombank also will raise trillions of dong in the forthcoming issue to hike its chartered capital by 9.28 percent.

In a talk with investors, a general director of construction material supply company confirmed that with much lower cost compared with the previous period, his firm still can invest in a factory with similar capacity. In addition, increasing production capacity based on the consumption demand will create opportunities for enterprises to dominate market, expand market shares in the near future. This is the major reason the leader proposed shareholders to approve the firm's share sales plan.

But, the capital raising via the stock market will be the double-edged knife if the enterprises abuse the method while their investment opportunities have not been clear.

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VNStockNews.com - The recovery of the world stock market along with positive changes in Vietnam's macroeconomic will be the factors affecting positively on Vietnam's stock market in the near future. It is common opinion shared by experts in the informal talk held on Saturday, November 14 in HCM City.

The talk "Identify opportunities back to market' held by the Saigon Thuong Tin Commercial Bank (Sacombank)'s Securities Co (Sacombank-SBS attracted over 500 investors in the hall of the HCM City University of Economics.

Le Ba Hoang from SBS said that, the Vietnam's stock market has undergone 10 months of successes compared with the whole last year. Vietnam's macroeconomic situation has made good strides such as the economic growth target at 5-5.2 percent in 2009 and the 6.5 percent growth target for 2010 is not too hard. The recent brisk stock transactions showed that many investors are expecting on soon restore ability of the economy. This also confirmed the confidence of investors into the stock market.

Quach Manh Hao, deputy general director of Thang Long Securities Co (TSC) predicted the Vietnam's stock market could be up to 700-800 points in two last months this year.

However Hao added we should consider forecasting about global economic scenario and Vietnam's economy because at present Vietnamese stock market is not affected by the issues of real economic, but it is affected from faith and money supply. Most investors would buy according to the rumour and sell according to the news.

The flourish of Vietnam's stock market is strengthening confidence for investors, but in order to maintain this flourish, it needs to have upwards movements of the international market. In addition, business results in Q3 2009 are also important factors affecting on the recovery of the domestic market.

As for the foreign indirect investment (FII) capital flow, Nguyen Viet Cuong, deputy chief executive of Vina Capital investment fund, said that foreign investment is returning to Vietnam's stock market and became the market's belief focus.

According to Cuong's analysis, growth rate of companies would average at 18 percent in 2010. High profit also reduced the P/E index (price index on earnings per share) at the end of October in comparison with previous month. Cuong also said that with the P/E index at 14 (based on the profit of latest four quarters), the Vietnam stock market is more attractive than many other countries in the region and it will be an opportunity to attract more investors.

Also, Tran Hoang Ngan, vice Rector of HCM City University of Economics, warned credit growth has exceeding the target raised worries about the limitation of money supply as well as the risk on policy will negatively affect on the stock market.

Till the end of October, total outstanding debt increased to 33.29 percent compared to last year, exceeding 3.29 percent compared with this year's growth target of 30 percent. This made the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) may apply measures to tighten credit and investors may be affected because most of their investment capital into the stock market is from loans of banks through the methods of financial levers consumer loans.

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VNStockNews.com - Military Commercial Joint Stock Bank (MB) has recently held the extraordinary shareholders meeting in which the shareholders have approved the bank's methods of increasing chartered capital in 2009, the ways to use ownership capital and adjustments in the bank's regulations.

At the meeting, the management board has proposed two methods of raising the chartered capital with the purpose of seeking the shareholders' opinions. In the first method, the bank planned to issue 90 million shares, equal to share value of 900 billion dong for the strategic and potential shareholders with negotiated price. However, the bank's staff and existing shareholders can purchase the new shares with offered price.

In the second method to be proposed, the bank will issue 90 million shares or 900 billion dong in par value to the strategic and potential shareholders, both domestic and foreign ones with negotiated price, offering shares for the bank's staff with initial price equivalent to the face value, and allocating bonus shares for the existing shareholders. The capital sources for issuing new shares will be from the bank's funds in accordance with the current laws.

According to the management board's explanation, in case the bank gets approval from the state management authorities for using the fund of share capital surplus and other funds in accordance with the laws for allocating bonus shares, the second methods will be applied at priority.

The two methods are supposed to be carried out before December 31, 2009.

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VNStockNews.com - Instead of preparing to list on UPCoM market, many banks and the enterprises being listed on the UPCoM floor have already started to eye listing on the centralised stock market, UPCoM has not been attractive as for banks any more despite in October early, commercial banks themselves can decide the listing on UPCoM without SBV's permission.

Previously, when UPCoM -called the securities trading market for unlisted public companies-officially started operation, SCB, DaiABank and OCB decided to make procedures to put bank shares into transactions on the floor.

But recently SCB cancelled the plan of listing on UPCoM before officially obtaining license while DaiA Bank (coded DAB) gained Hanoi Stock Exchange's permission to list 100 million DAB shares at 10,000 dong par on UPCoM. With this event, DaiA Bank was expected to become the first listed bank on the market.
Accordingly, DaiA Bank will go on UPCoM in the middle of November. However, the bank proposed shareholders to re-consider the listing move to Hochiminh Stock Exchange (STC) instead of UPCoM.

Director board of DaiA Bank said that the small trading size of UPCoM could affect he market price of DAB so the reconsideration of floor moving is necessary. Finally, on November 9, the bank decided to abolish the transaction on UPCoM and stop deposit at Securities Depository Centre and prepared listing on the southern official stock market.

After seeking shareholders' approval on issuing second-phase shares to hike chartered capital from 2.304 trillion dong to 2.568 trillion dong, Southern Bank announced it would make legislative procurements to go on the official stock floor.

STC said approving Western Bank's registration to list 100 million ordinary shares on the bourse. Western Bank also was licensed to raise its chartered capital to two trillion dong. Till late September, the pre-tax profit of Western Bank reached 68.41 billion dong while the total assets were posted at over five trillion dong.

Meanwhile, Eastern Commercial JS Bank (EAB) wants to sell shares to foreign strategic shareholders to hike capital from 3.4 trillion dong to 4.5 trillion dong. But, in the context of global economic downturn, the share sales will not bring benefits as expected by shareholders. The bank plans to list on STC by 2010. Thus, EAB decided to offer 1.1 trillion dong of shares with a price of 10,000 dong/share to reach a chartered capital of 4.5 trillion dong. Tran Phuong Binh, general director of EAB said that his bank will select a suitable time to list next year.

Similarly, LienVietBank, Maritime Bank reported they would finish the listing applications soon after gaining authorities' license.

The listing move to the official stock market will increase the option of investors as for banking-finance shares. Up to now, both STC and HNX have six listed bank shares including STB, ACB, VCB, CTG, EIB and SHB. Yet, all shares have not had big changes in prices till now.

Ending last Friday, STC listed CTG attained 32,000 dong/share, VCB at 49,800 dong/share, STB at 27,800 dong/share, EIB at 26,500 dong/share, down 1,500 dong from October 27, HNX listed ACB was traded at 41,000 dong and SHB at 27,300 dong/share.

Banking operations are still regarded to have high profitability just when the market had to face difficulties coming from the impacts of global economic storm. Factually, compared with the previous year, banks' profit target is lower but during the first three quarters, many banks reported a very high profit exceeding the full year's plan. Typically, in Jan-Oct, Maritime Bank earned 780 billion dong in pre-tax profit, higher 180 billion dong than the year's target while EAB confirmed it can reach the 2009 profit of 750 billion dong.

However, the business of small to medium sized banks was not satisfactory in the first nine months. DaiA Bank achieved only 38.62 billion dong in pre-tax profit so it had to lower the 2009 profit target from 170 billion dong to 60 billion dong.

According to Vietnam Equity Holding (VEH) under Saigon Asset Management (SAM), the development potential of banking and finance of Vietnam remains very high because the number of people using bank accounts and credit cards is small.

A stock specialist forecasted that the merger of small banks will be unavoidable but this will help the banking system operate better and more effectively if having a perfect legislative frame.

Meanwhile, as for most investors, bank shares are not subject to their priority commodity portfolio.

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VNStockNews.com - Hoa Binh Rubber Joint Stock Co (coded HRC) has recently announced that in October, the company exploited more 640 tonnes of gum rubber, bringing the company's total gum rubber volume in Jan-October to 3,687 tonnes of gum rubber, achieving 73.74 percent of this year's plan.

In October, HRC sold 954 tonnes of gum rubber with average selling price at 35.4 million dong/tonne, up one million dong per tonne against previous month.

In October, HRC's revenue was 33.7 billion dong.
In Jan-Oct, HRC sold 4,946 tonnes of gum rubber, earning 149 billion dong.

In 2009, HRC targets to exploit 5,000 tonnes of gum rubber with total revenue of 161 billion dong and 40.6 billion dong of pre tax profit.

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