The country’s national flag carrier Vietnam Airlines will sell more than 24 million shares it is holding in Techcombank on December 2, announced the Hanoi Stock Exchange.

This is the second time the corporation has called for the auction after the first auction failed on September 26, as only one investor registered to buy.

The shares, accounting for 2.7-percent stake in the bank, will be auctioned at the Hanoi bourse at an initial price of 10,800 VND (0.51 USD) per share. In the first auction, shares were offered at 12,100 VND (0.57 USD) per share.

Although no share were sold in the first auction, Vietnam Airlines had successfully sold all of its nearly 828,000 ten-year convertible bonds in the first auction to five investors, earning more than 109.8 billion VND (5.18 million USD).

The selling is part of the road map to withdraw capital from non-core lines of business, in accordance with a restructuring scheme approved by Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung for the 2012-15 period.

Vietnam Airlines currently has 82 aircraft of various types, such as Boeing 777, Airbus A330, Airbus A321, and it plans to expand its fleet to 101 planes by 2015 and to 150 planes by 2020.-VNA