Property, resources fill top stock portfolios

VNStockNews.com - Real estate and natural resource investors hold Vietnam’s most valuable stock portfolios, with the country’s top investor worth over US$700 million.

Dang Thanh Tam, head of Saigon Investment Corp. (SGI), topped the list, leaving the second position to last year’s number-one investor Doan Nguyen Duc, chairman of Hoang Anh Gia Lai Joint Stock Co.

Duc told Thanh Nien earlier he was sure to be Vietnam’s first dollar-billionaire in 2010.

Tam, who was also Vietnam’s most valuable portfolio holder in 2007, saw his worth in stocks rise after the Saigon – Quy Nhon Natural Resources Joint Stock Co. (SQC), which is a member of SGI, listed on the Hanoi Stock Exchange on December 17.

Tam is the largest shareholder in Tan Tao Investment Industry Corp. (ITA), Saigon Telecommunications Joint Stock Co. (SGT), SQC and Kinh Bac Development Share Holding Corp. (KBC) – the second largest firm by market value on the Hanoi stock market – owning more than VND13.2 trillion (US$714.7 million) in shares as of Wednesday, around four fold his share value in 2008.

Duc holds around VND11.3 trillion in total stocks.

Tam is set for more prosperity in 2010 as SGI members such as Nam Viet (Southern Vietnam) Bank, or Navibank, and Western Bank will be traded on the Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City stock markets respectively.

The third and fourth positions were unchanged from last year with Pham Nhat Vuong, member of the board of directors of the Hanoi-based real estate developer Vincom Joint Stock Co. (VIC), followed by Tran Dinh Long, chairman of Hoa Phat Group, Vietnam’s largest-listed steel producer.

Vuong’s wife Pham Thu Huong also entered the top 10 most prosperous Vietnamese of the year for the first time, taking the eighth spot.

The fifth position was also occupied by a newcomer to the list Nguyen Thi Kim Xuan, Tam’s sister-in-law and owner of bulky KBC, SGT and SQC holdings worth more than VND2.56 trillion in total.

Next was Nguyen Duy Hung, general director of Vietnam’s largest brokerage – Saigon Securities Inc. (SSI). Hung owns around VND2.47 trillion in SSI stocks.

Tam’s sister Dang Thi Hoang Phuong, chairman of SQC, took spot seven on the list with more than VND1.63 trillion in a portfolio similar to Xuan’s.

The last two members of the top 10 list were Le Phuoc Vu, general director of Hoa Sen Group, the second-largest listed steel producer in the country, and Truong Thi Le Khanh, chairman of Vinh Hoan Corp. (VHC), Vietnam’s second-largest seafood processor.

The top 10 investors now own nearly VND40 trillion ($2.17 billion) in shares, around the value owned by the top 100 in 2008.

Dinh The Hien, director of the HCMC-based Institute of Informatics and Applied Economic Research, noted that a major change this year was that real estate and mining investments proved more valuable than those in the banking and technology sectors.