ACB becomes 5th largest investment of VOF

Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - VinaCapital Vietnam Opportunity Fund (VOF), the flagship fund of VinaCapital, announced that Asia Commercial Bank (ACB) had become its 5th largest investment.

VOF said it continued to buy more shares of ACB in October. This is the 6th largest bank by market capitalisation in Vietnam and a leading commercial bank in the retail and small and medium enterprise (SME) segments. With its experience in the development of digital banking, VinaCapital said it would share such insights with ACB's leaders.

ACB accounted for 4.9 percent of VOF’S total net asset value (NAV) at the end of October, equivalent to nearly 46.3 million USD.

ACB is currently listed on the HNX but the bank has submitted an application to transfer listing to HoSE in mid-October.

VinaCapital expects the bank to be listed on HoSE in December 2020 or January 2021 and may enter the VN-30 basket, which consists of the 30 largest companies listed on HoSE in terms of market capitalisation.

According to the 9-month business report, ACB recorded pre-tax profit of 6.4 trillion VND (227.1 million USD), 15 percent higher than the same period in 2019, equivalent to 84 percent of the 2020 plan. Post-tax profit reached 5.13 trillion VND.

ACB on November 18 also announced the signing of a 15-year exclusive bancassurance partnership with Sun Life Vietnam Insurance Co Ltd.

VOF’s total NAV reached nearly 945 million USD at the end of October, up 2 percent from the previous month. In 10 months, the fund's NAV growth was 10.7 percent, compared with the 2.3 percent-decrease of VN-Index in the same period.

VOF attributed its positive performance to its persistent investments in industries with high resilience, especially companies that benefit from policies such as public investment and FDI inflows.

So far this year, construction material stocks recorded the best growth in prices of 44.7 percent. Steel giant Hoa Phat Group (HPG) currently accounts for the largest proportion of 15.7 percent in VOF’s total net asset value (NAV), reporting growth of 59 percent.

Consumer goods stocks ranked second with an increase of 8 percent since the beginning of the year, as evidenced by Vinamilk (VNM) increasing 14.5 percent and accounting for 4.4 percent of VOF’s NAV./.