A stretch of pipeline is coated at PetroVietnam Coating Corporation (HNX: PVB). The company is among the three HNX30 large-caps that posted losses between July and September. — Photo pvcoating.vn

The top 60 biggest companies by market capitalisation and trading liquidity on the two local stock exchanges saw combined post-tax profit gain of 22.5 per cent to VND46.75 trillion (US$2 billion) in the third quarter of 2019.

Profits recorded by the top 30 firms on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange accounted for nearly 92.3 per cent of the total figure.

They posted VND43.14 trillion in Q3 post-tax profit, up 23.8 per cent year on year. The figure was 12 times the profits made by the 30 top companies on the Ha Noi Stock Exchange, which was VND3.6 trillion.

After nine months, the 60 biggest listed companies on the two local exchanges earned a total of VND113.86 trillion in post-tax profit, a yearly increase of 14.6 per cent.

In terms of total asset, VN30 companies had more than VND7 trillion worth of assets on September 30. The figure was 8.3 times HNX30 firms’ and up 2.3 per cent from the previous quarter ending June 30.

Twenty-one of the 30 firms in the VN30 basket announced annual profit growth in the third quarter and nine others had negative earnings growth rates.

Lender Sacombank (STB) and insurer Bao Viet Group (BVH) were the two firms recording the biggest jumps in earning growth rates.

Sacombank posted a 373 per cent increase in profit, which reached VND772 billion in Q3. After nine months, the bank doubled its post-tax profit to VND1.92 trillion from last year’s figure.

Bao Viet Group’s Q3 post-tax profit tripled from the previous year to VND372 billion in 2019. The group earned a total of VND1.04 trillion worth of post-tax profit in the January-September period.

Other VN30 firms that also recorded strong annual increase of profits in the third quarter included Vietcombank (VCB), property developer Vinhomes (VHM), Techcombank (TCB), VPBank (VPB) and Masan Group (MSN).

On the opposite end, steel producer Hoa Phat (HPG), multi-sector business Vingroup (VIC), real estate firm Novaland (NVL), PetroVietnam Gas Corp (GAS), building contractor Coteccons (CTD) and SSI Securities Corp (SSI) were the firms whose profits in the third quarter of 2019 were beaten by last year’s figures.

In the HNX30 basket, Asia Commercial Bank (ACB) was still the most profitable business, posting an annual growth of 18.3 per cent in third-quarter post-tax profit, which was VND1.55 trillion.

The bank’s Q3 profit was equal to 75 per cent of the rest HNX30 large-cap firms’ total. Its nine-month post-tax profit also rose 18 per cent on-year to VND4.45 trillion, accounting for 87 per cent of the full-year target.

Three companies in the HNX30-Index posting losses in the third quarter were PetroVietnam Coating Corporation (PVB), Tri Viet Group (TVC) and constructor Vimeco JSC (VMC).

According to analysts and investors, share prices of HNX30 firms are lower than those of VN30 companies because of the lower earnings recorded by the former.

HNX30 companies’ shares ranged from VND1,300 per share to VND85,800 per share at Friday close.

Meanwhile, none of the VN30 firms’ stocks ended last week below the stock’s par value of VND10,000 per share. The most valuable VN30 stock was brewer Sabeco (SAB), which finished Friday at VND252,000. — VNS