Stock market standardised in accordance with international practice: insider

Hanoi (VNA) - The Vietnamese stock market will continue to be supported by a number of positive internal and external factors of the economy as well as the market itself in 2021, Ta Thanh Binh, Director of Securities Market Development Department under the State Securities Commission, told the press on January 19.

Positive changes in quality

Regarding world economy and finance, Binh said that vaccines that are being licensed and are being inoculated on a large scale in many countries have supported the psychology of big investors. In addition, the economies of some major Asian countries such as Japan and China have recovered since the third quarter of 2020 and tend to continue recovering in 2021.

In Vietnam, Binh pointed to many positive factors, such as stable macro-economic situation, inflation curbed, public investment stepped up. The country’s Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) has continuously reached over 50 points in recent months after falling to the bottom in April 2020.

“This shows a clear recovery of domestic production. In addition, international organisations have also made optimistic forecasts about Vietnam’s economic prospects. According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Vietnam’s economy will recover in 2021 with a GDP growth rate of about 6.5 percent, while the World Bank (WB) forecasts that Vietnam's GDP will increase about 6.8 percent. Furthermore, the latest information shows that Vietnam’s first vaccine has completed the research process and achieved high efficiency in testing, promising to be put into use soon,” said Binh.

Assessing the prospect of the stock market in 2021, Binh said that there will be many positive changes in quality. Specifically, the Securities Law 2019, four decrees and 11 guiding circulars, effective from January 1, will create a standardised legal corridor and contribute to the development of an open and transparent stock market in accordance with international standards.

Build a long-term market development roadmap

With the legal basis for market development built in the past year, in 2021, Binh said that the stock industry will focus on implementing a number of key tasks.

Specifically, the State Securities Committee focuses on putting new regulations and policies of the Securities Law and guiding documents into practice, to support businesses, protect the legitimate rights and interests of investors, thus creating a driving force for Vietnam’s stock market to develop sustainably.

The committee will make and submit to the Prime Minister for the issuance of a strategy on stock market development for 2021-2030 to set forth targets and solutions to develop the stock and capital markets in a long term.

In addition, the sector also aims to complete a project to modernise information technology for transactions and payment in order to carry out new financial products.

One of the tasks and highlights of this year is to accelerate the restructuring of the stock market and complete the apparatus of the Vietnam Stock Exchange in accordance with the Government’s Decision No. 37/2020/QD-TTg dated December 23, 2020, and improve the efficiency of management and supervision of the stock market and strictly handle violations, said Binh.

In 2020, despite severe impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Vietnamese stock market had a sustainable recovery and spectacular growth and was considered one of the ten stock markets with the best pandemic resistance and recovery in the world.

The market had an impressive year of growth with the VN-Index surpassing 1,100 points, reaching 1103.87 points, a sharp increase of 67 percent compared to the lowest point of 2020, and an increase of 14.9 percent compared to the end of 2019. Besides, the HNX-Index increased by nearly 119 percent compared to the end of the first quarter of 2020 and by 98.1 percent compared to the end of 2019./.