Losing billions of dollars, Vietnam's highest priced stock is restricted from trading

The Hanoi Stock Exchange (HNX) has just announced that the unicorn stock VNZ of VNG Corporation has been put on restricted trading list from today, May 25. This means that VNZ shares will only be traded on Fridays every week.

The reason is that VNZ is late in submitting the audited financial statements for 2022 more than 45 days from the deadline for information disclosure as prescribed.

Previously, on March 31, VNG announced unusual information about the postponement of the announcement of the audited financial statements for 2022. Accordingly, VNZ said that the enterprise was late in submitting the report because it was conducting financial statements in parallel according to Vietnamese accounting standards (VAS) and international accounting standards (IFRS).

VNG is a technology corporation with business operations in Vietnam and many other countries around the world. VNG currently has 33 subsidiaries and affiliates, of which 18 are companies and charity funds in Vietnam and 14 are overseas companies with different accounting and legal regulations.

In the session on May 24, VNZ shares increased slightly to VND769,000/share and remained the stock with the highest market price on the stock exchange. However, compared to the peak reached in mid-February, this stock has decreased by more than 45%, evaporating about 1 billion USD. The capitalization is about 1.2 billion USD.

In the first quarter of 2023, VNG recorded net revenue of VND 1,852 billion and gross profit of VND 847 billion, up 11% and 17% respectively over the same period last year.

On February 16, VNZ shares reached over 1.56 million VND/share after 11 consecutive ceiling price sessions (from the initial reference price of 240,000 VND/share).

At that time, VNZ (owner of Zalo application) became the enterprise with the highest stock price of all time on the Vietnamese stock market with a capitalization of more than 55.9 trillion VND (about 2.3 billion USD).

At the current price (769,000 VND), CEO Le Hong Minh of VNZ has assets of about 2,700 billion VND, in the top 50 richest people in Vietnam. Ranked 2nd in the top richest technology entrepreneurs, just behind Mr. Truong Gia Binh (Chairman of FPT - who currently has 6,320 billion VND).

VNZ is considered Vietnam's first "unicorn", a technology startup with a valuation of over 1 billion USD.

Previously, investors also witnessed FPT Technology Group of Chairman Truong Gia Binh with a capitalization of billions of USD (reaching about 3.8 billion USD as of May 24). However, FPT is not called a unicorn like VNG or VNPay because it is too mature, has been operating for more than 25 years, and no longer has a startup character.

VNZ's current capitalization is around $1.2 billion, just slightly higher than its valuation of $1 billion in 2014 and lower than the $2.2 billion valuation by Singapore's Temasek Investment Fund in 2019.

Valuation of technology companies is not a conventional calculation. In the world, there are many cases of large losses but still very high valuations.

Currently, VNZ has a concentrated shareholder structure with one foreign shareholder holding 49%; Big V Technology JSC (19.8%) and Mr. Le Hong Minh 9.84%.

Currently, investors still expect VNZ's major projects such as: leading position in the field of online games and advertising; ZaloPay's orientation to become the number 1 e-wallet in Vietnam; VNG Data Center; plan to list shares on the US stock exchange...

Vietnamese billionaires' assets tend to decrease slightly

After a sharp increase in January of 2023, many Vietnamese billionaires saw their assets decline in February and have tended to remain flat in recent months.

As of May 24, according to Forbes, billionaire Pham Nhat Vuong had assets worth 4.3 billion USD, lower than the 4.5 billion USD recorded on January 27 (the session right after Lunar New Year).

*Fluctuations in assets of Vietnamese billionaires. (Chart: M. Ha)*

Billionaire Tran Dinh Long's assets decreased by 1.8 billion USD as of May 24. Mr. Nguyen Dang Quang and Ho Hung Anh also recorded a slight decrease in assets (compared to the ranking on April 4, 2023) to 1.1 billion USD and 1.4 billion USD.

Thus, according to Forbes, as of May 24, 2023, Vietnam has 6 USD billionaires compared to 7 people in the ranking in March 2022.

The Vietnamese USD billionaires ranked in order according to Forbes' list include: Mr. Pham Nhat Vuong (Chairman of Vingroup), Ms. Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao (CEO of VietJet Air), Mr. Tran Dinh Long (Chairman of Hoa Phat Group), Mr. Tran Ba Duong and his family (owner of Thaco automobile assembly and manufacturing company), Mr. Ho Hung Anh (Chairman of Techcombank), and Mr. Nguyen Dang Quang (Chairman of Masan).

Mr. Tran Dinh Long surpassed Mr. Ho Hung Anh thanks to the strong recovery of Hoa Phat Group (HPG) shares since November 2022. Large organizations are still pouring money into HPG shares.

Statistics show that, as of May 24, all 6 Vietnamese USD billionaires had total assets of about 12.3 billion USD, lower than the 18.3 billion USD recorded in the ranking in March 2022 (not including 2.9 billion USD of Mr. Bui Thanh Nhon at that time).

With skyrocketing stock prices, the owner of a Vietnamese unicorn has entered the group of trillion-dollar tycoons . Vietnamese unicorn stock VNZ recorded its first transaction after nearly a month of being listed on the stock exchange and immediately set a record high price, at the same time bringing CEO Le Hong Minh into the club of people with trillion-dollar assets.

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