A MB Securities Co's trading room. The company was among the top three underwriters for corporate bond issuance in the January-October period. — Photo thoibaotaichinhvietnam.vn

The total value of corporate bonds was VND178.7 trillion (US$7.7 billion) in January-October this year, according to SSI Retail Research.

Commercial banks remained the biggest bond issuers with VND79.4 trillion worth of bond issuance, accounting for 44.4 per cent of the total figure.

Real estate companies issued VND61.27 trillion worth of corporate bonds, accounting for 34.3 per cent of the total.

The remainders were infrastructure developers, securities firms and other types of business.

In 2010, more than VND17 trillion worth of corporate bond notes was issued with about 55 per cent of the total belonging to real estate firms.

The biggest issuers included Vinametric Co Ltd, the owner of Saigon Prince Hotel in HCM City.

The company issued VND3.7 trillion worth of two-year bonds with yield rate set at 10.5 per cent per annum for the first year.

In the second year, the yield rate would be the central bank’s reference rate plus 3.65 per cent per year. Interest is paid every six months.

Following the hotel operator was Sai Gon Vina Real Estate JSC (Land Saigon) that issued VND1.85 trillion worth of three-year bonds with a fixed yield rate of 11 per cent per annum.

Average bond yield rate in October was 10.5 per cent per annum, which was up 2.7 per cent from September.

Banks had the lowest bond yield rates and also lowered their issuance last month. Meanwhile, data showed property firms’ average bond yield rate rose from 9.6 per cent in September to 10.5 per cent in October.

Foreign investors purchased 7.6 per cent of the total bond issuance and the rest was sold to domestic investors.

A large number of bond issuance was confidential. For public deals, securities firms were the biggest buyers as they bought VND31.4 trillion worth of bonds in 10 months, accounting for 18 per cent of the total.

Brokerage firms targeted bank bonds as 80 per cent of their purchases were issued by local banks. Meanwhile, commercial banks invested VND12 trillion into bonds of property and infrastructure developers.

Techcombank Securities Co (TCBS), VNDirect Securities Corp (VNDS) and MB Securities Co (MBS) were the top three underwriters in the 10-month period, focusing on real estate and bank bonds. — VNS