Landmark anti-corruption cases help better Vietnam stock, bond markets: police officer

Investigations into and the handling of a series of corruption cases in the private sector have helped improve the performance of the stock and bond markets, said a senior police official.

In response to reporters’ questions at a regular government press meeting late on Friday, Lieutenant General To An Xo, spokesperson for the Ministry of Public Security, noted that his ministry was the key force in the anti-corruption drive in 2023, in the spirit of upholding the rule of law and going through “no-go” zones.

The stand out cases have been the market manipulation scandal at FLC Group, a bond scam at Tan Hoang Minh Group, bank dealings at Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB), policy maneuvers at vehicle register centers nationwide, fuel trading fraud at Xuyen Viet Oil, and natural resource appropriation in An Giang province.

“It’s obvious that after those cases, those with malign intentions of manipulation will have to think again,” Xo stressed.

The arrests of Trinh Van Quyet, former chairman of Hanoi-based FLC Group in March 2022, Truong My Lan, chairwoman of Van Thinh Phat Group, and her associates from October 2022 rocked the Vietnamese stock market. The VN-Index, which tracks Vietnam’s major bourse the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange dropped 34% that year.

Violations of bond issuance regulations at several firms in Van Thinh Phat Group’s network forced the finance ministry to tighten conditions for corporate bond sales, leading to a period of doldrums and caution.

Since mid-2023, the local corporate bond market has shown signs of warming up. In November, there were 27 corporate bond sales privately placed with a combined value of VND27.47 trillion ($1.13 billion), 14 times higher than a year earlier. Between December 1-22, 2023, local companies raised a combined VND16.48 trillion ($678.2 million) from bonds in private placements, tripling the same period of 2022, according to VNDIRECT Securities.

The VN-Index ended up 12.2% year-on-year in 2023, exchange data showed.