Vietnam’s MB Bank to sell 49% of Cambodia unit to Shinsei: report

HANOI-BASED Military Commercial Joint Stock Bank (MB Bank) plans to sell about 49 per cent of its shares in its Cambodian unit to Tokyolisted Shinsei Bank Ltd for an undisclosed sum as soon as in October-December, according to a Bloomberg report.

Luu Trung Thai, CEO of MB Bank, which has set its sights on “profit growth” of 23 per cent for this year, said the Hanoi-listed lender spent $75 million to establish the Cambodian unit, founded in 2018, Bloomberg reported on April 23.

As part of efforts to revamp Vietnam’s bad debt-laden banking industry, the government aims to restructure OceanBank, Vietnam Construction Bank and GPBank. Thai says MB Bank seeks to acquire a struggling Vietnamese lender in 2022.

“We see taking on a restructured bank as a challenge but also an opportunity for us to grow as it will help us boost our total assets and lending,” Bloomberg quoted Thai as saying. MB Bank anticipates credit growth to pick up to 20 per cent this year, and total assets to increase 15-18 per cent, he added.

MB Bank Cambodia was officially inaugurated on September 4, 2019, marked by a ribbon-cutting ceremony presided over by National Bank of Cambodia governor Chea Chanto.

However, the first branch of MB Bank in the Kingdom had been officially launched nearly eight years earlier, on December 20, 2011, with initial capital of $39 million.

According to Bloomberg, Thai said that MB Bank aims for 100,000 new enterprise clients and up to five million individual ones each year, and expects 18 per cent of earnings in 2022 to come from its two insurance units and a brokerage, up from some 13 per cent in 2021.

On the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange, MB Bank shares closed flat at 30,000 dong ($1.31) on Friday, April 22, while market capitalisation ended at 113.35 trillion dong, with 11.45 million shares traded. Shares have risen 3.81 per cent from end-2021, while Vietnam’s benchmark VN Index has dipped by 7.95 per cent over the same period.

And on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, Shinsei Bank’s share price fell 50 yen (38.89 US cents) or 2.08 per cent to close at 2,356.0 yen ($18.32) on Friday, April 22 for a market capitalisation of 491.56 billion yen, with some 823,100 shares traded. However, shares have risen 25.79 per cent from end-2021.