Hochiminh Stock Exchange (HOSE)
In an effort to industrialize and modernize the country, maintain stable economic growth and restructure the economy to enhance its efficiency and competition, Vietnam had needed huge capital of investment. Therefore, building securities market in Vietnam had become urgent demand to mobilize mid-term and long-term capital within as well as outside the country into economic investment through debt securities and capital securities. In addition, equitization of state-owned enterprises along with establishment and development of securities market would create opener and healthier business environment. On July 10th 1998, the Prime Minister signed Decree No. 48/1998/ND-CP on stock and securities market and a Decision to set up two (02) securities trading centers at Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.
On July 20th 2000, the Ho Chi Minh City Securities Trading Center was officially put into operation and executed the first trading session on July 28th 2000 with 2 types of listing stocks.
After 7 years of growing and integrating into the global securities market, the government signed Decision No. 599/QD-TTg on May 11th 2007 to transfer the Ho Chi Minh City Securities Trading Center to Hochiminh Stock Exchange (HOSE). On August 8th 2007, Hochiminh Stock Exchange was officially opened.
Until now, Hochiminh Stock Exchange has gained encouraging achievement. Till December 31st 2007, there had been 507 types of listing securities consisting of the followings: 138 stocks with total capitalization value of VND365,000 billion, including the contribution of 6 foreign – owned companies; 03 fund certificates with volume of 171.4 million units and 366 bond types. In the near future, the number of listing stocks on HOSE will increase quickly because the government has policy to equitize some big companies and state-owned commercial banks to list on the market.
Thanks to the growth of the stock market, the number of member securities companies of HOSE has been increasing in volume, size and service quality. Till the end of December 31st 2007, there had been 62 securities companies registering to be members of HOSE with total registered capital of VND9,960 billion. Most of member securities companies have been granted licenses covering all kinds of businesses: brokerage, dealing on own accounts, underwriting and investment advisory.
A quick increase in the number of listing stocks in the market has attracted many local and foreign investors, individuals as well as institutions. At the end of 2006, the number of investor accounts opened in member securities companies was 106,000. At the end of 2007, this number grew to 298,000 in which foreign investors made up over 7,000 accounts.
To satisfy the requirements for the market’s growth, the Hochiminh Stock Exchange has applied continuous order matching method since July 30th, 2007 and accepted remote terminals few months later. As of December 31st, 2007, we held 1,699 trading sessions with the total volume of 4,225 million shares and total value of VND384,452 billion. In 2007, the total trading volume was 2,390 shares and the total trading value was VND245,651 billion.
As from the end of September 2007, the trading value of the whole market has reached over VND1,000 billion per session. The price fluctuation can be seen clearly via VN INDEX’s changes: from 307.5 points in late 2005 to the record 1,170.67 points on March 12th, 2007.
Regarding to foreign activities, we have signed many MoU with other exchanges in London, New York, Malaysia, Singapore, Czech, Warsaw (Poland), Tokyo (Japan), etc., on IT, training, information and cross listing (in the future).