Ten commercial banks will have to sprint to be able to meet the Government’s listing deadline on the Unlisted Public Company Market (UPCoM) by the end of this year.

According to the Government’s regulations, all 730 equitised companies yet to be listed on the UPCoM will have to list on the bourse by the end of this year. Ten banks - OCB, ABBank, Techcombank and NamABank, as well as MaritimeBank, VietABank, TPBank and Seabank, along with HDBank and LienVietPostBank, are among the firms named.

The 10 banks repeatedly made plans to list on the stock market in the past year, however, they were forced to postpone due to the unfavourable market conditions.

Till date, only VIB and Kienlongbank (KLB) have listed on UPCoM this year. VIB listed more than 564 million shares on the UPCoM on January 9 and plans to list on the HCM Stock Exchange next year. The VIB share is being traded at some VND22,300, increasing from VND17,000 on the first trading day. Meanwhile, 300 million KLB shares were listed on the UPCom on June 29 at VND10,000 per unit. The share is currently being traded at some VND10,300.

Previously, during the 2017 annual general meeting (AGM) season in April, shareholders of banks such as Techcombank, ABBank, OCB and LienVietPostBank approved the listing of banks’ shares on the UPCoM.

LienVietPostBank on July 17 announced the closing of the list of shareholders to follow procedures for listing 646.6 million bank shares on the UPCom.

Techcombank was also granted share code TCB to list on the bourse. The bank’s share is being traded at VND37,000 on the OTC market.

ABBank, meanwhile, still has to wait for the State Securities Commission’s approval to be able to list on the UPCoM this month.

With only 3 per cent of shareholders agreeing with the bank’s plan to list on UPCoM at its AGM in April, MaritimeBank has no plans to list on the market.

A similar trend was seen with HDBank. Explaining the move, HDBank leaders said not listing might not be to the bank’s disadvantage because the real value of HDBank will have to be assessed by the market at a time when the bank has confirmed its position, development strategy and prospects for the future. The listing will mean nothing if the bank’s share is listed and traded below the face value which is the case with some other listed banks. Currently, an HDBank share is being trading at VND17,000 on the OTC market.

According to analysts, now is the perfect time for banks to list their shares as market conditions are favourable with bank share prices having bounced back following a long period of decline. — VNS