HÀ NỘI — Unlisted Public Company Market (UPCoM) welcomed the listing of nearly 70 million shares of five companies on Monday, with share value registered for trading equal to VNĐ693.4 billion (US$31 million).

The five companies are 36 Corporation (G36), Sài Gòn-Nghệ Tĩnh Bear Joint Stock Company (SB1), Hà Nội Water Manufacturing Joint Stock Company No 3 (NS3), Quảng Ngãi Water Supply Sewerage and Construction Joint Stock Company (QNW) and Bridge Joint Stock Company No 12-Cienco 1 (C12).

Listings on UPCoM have witnessed a surge recently. On December 20, five companies were also listed on UPCoM, with total share value equal to VNĐ328.6 million.

The market appeared to be more attractive to investors as many large companies had listed or planned to list on UPCoM, following the regulation that State-owned enterprises which were public companies must register for trading on UPCoM following privatisation, in case they did not meet requirements for listing on the official exchanges.

UPCoM was founded in 2009 and currently more than 400 firms are listed on the market, with capitalisation value doubling the Hà Nội Stock Exchange.

However, its trading value was modest at around one fourth of the northern bourse. More than 140 stocks did not see transactions conducted in the past one month, partly due to investors’ hesitancy over transparency. — VNS