Hanoi(VNA) – As many as 667 equitized State-owned enterprises (SOEs), including manybig names, have yet to list their shares on the stock exchanges so far, saidMinister of Finance Dinh Tien Dung on November 21.

Among 295 SOEs managedby ministries yet to do so, the Vietnam Northern Food Corporation (Vinafood1)has the largest number of equitized but unlisted subsidiaries, 18, including HaSon Binh Food Company, Vinafood1 Flour Mill Company, VNF1 Distribution – RetailJSC, and Thanh Hoa Food JSC, Dung told the conference on restructuring andimproving efficiency of SOE operation in Hanoi.

It was followed by theVietnam National Textile and Garment Group (Vinatex) which has 14 subsidiariesof such type, including Chien Thang Garment JSC, Vinatex – Tan Tao InvestmentCorporation and Vietnam Wool JSC.

A number of others areowned by State-run giants like the Vietnam National Petroleum (Petrolimex),Vietnam Electricity (EVN), Vietnam Oil and Gas Group (PVN), Vietnam NationalChemical Group (Vinachem), and Vietnam Railways.

These firms mainlyblamed the delay in going public on challenges in pushing for organizational andoperational restructuring, or not meeting the listing requirements in terms ofthe number of shareholders or charter capital.

The Ministry ofFinance also named 372 unlisted SOEs managed by cities and provinces. Among theconcerned localities, Ho Chi Minh City leads the way with 11 corporations andgroups with hundreds of subsidiaries that have been equitized but not listed.

According to theministry, this situation has negative impacts on not only the stock market’s opennessand transparency but also the SOEs themselves as these firms have moved relativelyslow in post-equitisation corporate management restructuring to reach thestandards of those that went public.

Directive 04/CT-TTg issued by the Prime Minister on therestructuring and renovation of SOEs in 2016-2020 requires the SOEs to listtheir shares on the stock exchanges within a year after their initial publicofferings (IPOs).

In August this year,Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue again asked the Ministry of Finance and theGovernment Office to publicise the list of the SOEs failing to do so in time onthe websites of the ministry and the government. It was the third time the listof these SOEs has been ordered to open to the public, after the first in April,2017 and the second four months later.

Earlier this week, theMinistry of Finance announced that only 11 SOEs were equitised in the firstnine months of this year, making the country’s target to complete theequitisation of at least 85 SOEs this year unlikely to reach.

The divestment processduring the period was also sluggish and might fail to meet their goals for theyear. Under the plan, there were 135 SOEs that had to undergo the divestmentprocess in 2017 and 181 in 2018 but the State had divested capital from only 31firms, 13 of which conducted the process in 2017 and 18 did so in 2018. –VNA