PV Gas to sell stake in gas trading firm

Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - PetroVietnam Gas Corporation JSC (PV Gas) has decided it would sell its stake in the Southern Gas Trading JSC (PV Gas South).

PV Gas is now the biggest shareholder at the Southern Gas Trading with a 35.26 percent stake.

Southern Gas Trading is listing 50 million shares on the Hanoi Stock Exchange (HNX) with code PGS.

PGS soared 5.3 percent to end October 5 at 15,900 VND apiece following the news. At that price, the stake of PV Gas at the Southern Gas Trading JSC is worth 280 billion VND.

The company’s share price has fallen nearly a half from its one-year high of 32,000 VND apiece reached in October 2019.

PV Gas shares, listed on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange as GAS, edged up 0.8 percent to 72,500 VND apiece at the end of October 5.

PV Gas’ divestment plant was determined after the company previously failed to increase its stake in the Southern Gas Trading JSC.

In October 2019, PGS planned to sell 16.1 million shares for 23,409 VND per share, valuing the deal at 377 billion VND, to PV Gas to raise funding for its production and trading activities.

If the deal had been done, PV Gas would have upped its ownership in the Southern Gas Trading to 51.03 percent or 33.7 million shares.

PV Gas then could have been the parent company. But the deal was rejected by the Southern Gas Trading’s shareholders at the annual meeting on October 29, 2019.

PGS sells liquefied and compressed natural gas (LNG and CNG). The company takes a 35 percent market share in selling LPG in the South and Southern Central Region.

The company has recently acquired the Vietnam Gas Tank Co, which now produces a total of 379,000 tanks a year.

PGS also supplies CNG for the southern region with a wide range of customers working in different sectors, including materials and consumer segments.

In 2019, PV Gas South earned a total 6.38 trillion VND worth of revenue, fulfilling 97 percent of the year’s plan. Pre-tax profit in 2019 was 93 billion VND, equal to 90 percent of the year’s plan.

In the first half of 2020, the spread of coronavirus around the globe made PV Gas South suffer a post-tax loss of 20 billion VND./.