The Vietnam Prosperity Joint Stock Commercial Bank (VPBank) will buy back more than 73.2 million shares as treasury shares.

The shares were issued by the bank as preferred bonus shares on July 8, 2015.

VPBank will buy the shares at nearly VND34,000 (US$1.5) per share, it said in a filing to the HCM Stock Exchange.

The total value of the deal is estimated to be nearly VND2.5 trillion ($111 million). The transactions will be carried out between July 9 and 20.

VPBank has some 2.4 billion outstanding shares at the moment, of which more than 1.3 billion shares are listed on the HCM Stock Exchange under code VPB.

VPB fell 1.1 per cent to close Tuesday at VND32,550 per share.

VPBank recently announced the bank would finalise the list of shareholders who will receive 20 per cent cash dividend on Friday. The value of the dividend is estimated to be VND146 billion.

VPBank was approved by the State Bank of Viet Nam in late May to increase its charter capital to nearly VND25.3 trillion from the current VND15.7 trillion via five share issuances.

The bank earned VND2.6 trillion in pre-tax profit in the first quarter of 2018, a yearly increase of 36 per cent. — VNS