Vietinbank Securities profit drops 87 percent

Vietnam Bank for Industry & Trade Securities Co., the brokerage unit of the country’s fourth-biggest lender by assets, said net profit fell 87 percent as share values slumped.

Net income at Vietinbank Securities, as the company is known, declined to VND13 billion (US$732,000) last year from VND98 billion in 2007, according to a statement released Friday.

The benchmark VN-Index, a measure of 177 companies on the Ho Chi Minh City stock exchange, slid 66 percent last year, making it the worst performer in Asia. The index gained 4.3 percent to 325.05 Friday.

“The plunge in the stock market last year severely hit our businesses,” Phan Quoc Huynh, chief executive officer of Vietinbank Securities, said Friday in a presentation ahead of an initial share sale scheduled for April 22. The brokerage expects profit to rebound to VND90 billion this year, Huynh said.

Hanoi-based Vietinbank Securities will sell around 19.2 million shares at a minimum bid of VND10,200 on April 22, the Hanoi Securities Trading Center said late last month. The brokerage plans to list on the Ho Chi Minh City bourse in June, Huynh said last month.

Bloomberg

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