Vietjet Air will conduct an initial public offering (IPO) and listing in Vietnam before listing overseas.
Low-cost carrier must IPO and list in Vietnam before going overseas.
The company has completed the necessary documents for an overseas listing, becoming the first Vietnamese company to do so. The documents will therefore be available and accessible to potential investors.
Vietjet will probably conduct its IPO and listing in Vietnam this year and will then consider listing overseas, depending on market conditions and trends.
“The fact that we are first listing on Vietnam’s stock market abides by Vietnam’s securities laws and regulations,” Ms. Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao, CEO of Vietjet Air, said.
Vietjet, the fast-growing Vietnamese low-cost airline, has delayed plans for an initial public offering in Singapore or Hong Kong because of legal complications, in what would be the first overseas listing by a company from the Southeast Asian nation, according to the Financial Times.
“This has never been done before by any company in Vietnam,” said Ms. Thao said in Hong Kong, where she was announcing the airline’s latest international route. “We could not have imagined it required such a huge volume of documentation.”
Ms. Thao, a property and banking tycoon who founded Vietjet Air in 2011, previously said she hoped the IPO could go ahead as early as the second quarter of this year.
By bringing low-cost air travel to the growing middle class she hopes to copy the success of Tony Fernandes, who built AirAsia in Malaysia, and Rusdi Kirana, who founded Lion Air in Indonesia.
The airline last year carried 9.3 million passengers and is hoping to increase the number to 15 million this year through its new routes and growing fleet. It has placed orders this year for 100 Boeing 737s and 20 Airbus A321s.
The company is targeting an international listing in Hong Kong or Singapore but must first undertake an IPO domestically under Vietnamese law. Ms. Thao also said she expected strong demand among investors given Vietnam’s population of nearly 100 million people, its fast-growing economy, and increasing consumer demand. She hopes that the listing may still be completed this year.
Several large Vietnamese companies, including dairy group Vinamilk and property developer Vingroup, have previously said they were interested in foreign listings but have reconsidered given the market conditions.
