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Vietnam bank plans listing, cuts bad debt
VIB, Vietnam's eighth-largest partly private lender by assets, plans to list its shares within the next four years and could look for a foreign strategic investor before the listing, its chairman said.
The bank also said it had brought down its bad debt ratio this year at a time when its outstanding loans had jumped.
The listing is part of its business strategy for the period to 2013, aimed at helping the bank compete more closely with leading institutions such as Vietcombank and VietinBank, VIB Management Board Chairman Han Ngoc Vu said.
"We are actively discussing this (stake sale) issue and wish to do that before the listing," Vu told Reuters on Wednesday before launching a new logo and business strategy for Hanoi-based VIB, or Vietnam International Bank.
The retail bank said in a statement the 2009-2013 business strategy involved restructuring systems to focus on customers, plus using technology and developing network and staff capability to raise business efficiency.
The bank has not picked any dates for its listing and Vu did not name any potential investors. Vietnam caps foreign ownership of banks at 30 percent, with a 15 percent limit for a strategic investor.
The country's main stock market, with only five banks listed out of more than 40 partly private lenders, has risen 70 percent this year as the economy has picked up.
Several other banks, including Eximbank, 15 percent owned by Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group (SMFG), have plans to list this year. Eximbank has sought permission to list all its 880 million shares on the main market, the exchange said.
VIB said its assets had risen 35.4 percent so far this year to more than VND47 trillion (US$2.6 billion), while loans totalled VND24 trillion, a rise of nearly 22 percent from the end of 2008.
It said its bad debt stood at 1.63 percent of total loans, down from 1.87 percent at the end of 2008. In January a VIB executive told Reuters the ratio could rise this year as the bank applied a new credit rating system.
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