Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - TheState Securities Commission of Vietnam (SSC) will strengthen cooperation withthe Ministry of Public Security to bolster the inspection and handling ofmanipulation and insider trading on the stock market.

The statement was made by SSCVice Chairman Pham Hong Son at a brief meeting held earlier this week in Hanoi.

“One to two cases of manipulationand insider trading will be prosecuted after the Tet (Lunar New Year) holiday,”Son said.

“These practices cause damage tothe market and listed companies and should be strictly punished.”

 “The move is a deterrent topreventing the increasing number of violations of market regulations in thestock market,” Son said.

He added that the SSC could onlydeliver administrative sanctions so it had to cooperate closely with theMinistry of Public Security to handle cases that must face criminal charges.

“In the future, we will coordinatemore closely to rigorously handle violations so that the market operates withtransparency and efficiency," Son said.

When handling the cases, the SSCwill also consider the responsibility of brokers and securities companiesregarding their relationships with individuals and organisations that adoptprice manipulation practices.

Any record that shows signs of acriminal offense would be immediately transferred to the police, Son said.

Last year, the SSC imposedadministrative sanctions on 397 cases of manipulation with fines totalling 21billion VND. Nine individuals were detected as having manipulated stock prices,creating false supply and demand.

Regarding criminal cases, the HanoiPeople’s Court in October last year opened the first-ever trial in the case of15 people who were charged with the falsification of stock trading documents,stock price manipulation and fraudulent asset transfers.

The accused included 35-year-oldTran Huu Tiep – former management board chairman of the Central Mining andMineral Import Export JSC (MTM), 53-year-old Nguyen Van Dinh – former directorof the mining firm Nari Hamico, and former officials of the Bank for Investmentand Development of Vietnam (BIDV) and Tien Phong Bank (TPBank).

The defendants were reported tohave falsified trading documents of MTM shares on the Unlisted Public CompanyMarket (UPCoM), manipulated MTM share prices and fraudulently transferred MTMstocks on the market.

This is one of three criminalcases that were discovered and prosecuted.

The unification of the twoexisting bourses, approved by the Prime Minister recently, to establish the VietnamStock Exchange would help ease disadvantages of the current separate operatingmodels, said Ta Thanh Binh, head of the market development department at SSC atthe meeting.

Under the merger, the Hanoi-basedVietnam Stock Exchange would operate as a parent company for the Hanoi StockExchange and Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange.

The exchange would be in chargeof developing operational plans and strategies, issuing regulations about stocklistings and trading, and supervising the operation of the two subsidiaryexchanges.

The current separate tradingsystems of the two exchanges were independent and different, causing waste insocial resources and costs for investors.

In addition, many departments ofthe two bourses, such as the research and development department, administrativedepartment and international co-operation department, were doing the sametasks, leading to overlaps, Binh said.

According to Binh, the currenttrend of the world market is unification and merger of bourses into one, toincrease market size and international competitiveness and reduce costs forinvestors.

The merger of the two stockexchanges will create maximum conditions for in-depth development.-VNS/VNA