The Lien Viet bank has announced a plan to soon set up a series of affiliates in order to become a major financial group by early 2010.

Under the plan, the joint stock commercial bank will establish companies that deal in remittances, financial leasing, life insurance, capital funding, securities and a goods transaction service.

Lien Viet’s General Director, Nguyen Duc Huong, said that his bank has recently been making profits, posting an eight-month profit of 372 billion VND or 80 percent of its annual target.

The bank has managed to loan almost 5.79 trillion VND in credit, representing 77 percent of its yearly target despite the current global economic crisis, said the banks chief.

Last June, the Lien Viet Bank was granted a licence to increase its chartered capital to 3.65 trillion VND in 2009 from its initial register of 3.3 trillion VND after being in operation for just one and a half years.

The State Securities Commission has also approved the bank’s proposal to list its shares on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange by mid-2010.

The bank has also focused on social welfare and charity work such as funding the construction of schools, providing teaching aids and scholarships and presenting savings accounts to the mothers of fallen soldiers.

The bank has managed to attract a number of financial institutions and major banks, from both at home and overseas, such as the Bank of Agriculture and Rural Development of Vietnam (Agribank), the US bank Wells Fargo, Credit Suisse Bank from Switzerland and Oracle Financial Services Software, to be its shareholders and strategic partners.

Lien Viet Bank is looking to be placed as one of the country’s top ten commercial banks by the time it turns five years old./.