Top 50 public companies ranking released

A view of Vietcombank Tower in HCM City. Vietcombank continues to lead the Top 50 prestigious and effective public companies in 2024 (VIX50). — Photo Vietcombank

Vietnam Report JSC has announced its ranking for the top 50 most prestigious and effective public companies in 2024 (VIX50), which has undergone some significant changes compared to 2023.

The Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Foreign Trade of Việt Nam (Vietcombank) still hold the top spot in the ranking. Banking companies took seven out of the top 10 places on the list and 13 out of the top 50 rankings overall.

Three well-known enterprises, Đức Giang Chemicals Group JSC, Vietnam International Commercial Joint Stock Bank (VIB) and Petrovietnam Fertiliser and Chemicals Corporation (DPM) fell out of the Top 10, making room for Việt Nam Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Industry and Trade (Vietinbank); Bank for Investment and Development of Việt Nam (BIDV); and Gemadept Corporation. Both Vietinbank and BIDV are in the big four along with Vietcombank, meaning that three of the big four banks are ranked in the top 10.

Việt Nam's stock market fluctuated in 2023, but began to recover in the last two months of the year and continued on an upward trend at the start of 2024. After five consecutive months of growth, the VN-Index peaked at 1,290 points at the end of March and established a liquidity level exceeding VNĐ30 trillion. By the end of April, the market recovered after a strong correction in the first half of the month.

According to Vietnam Report's survey of public enterprises, 2024 will be a 'battle zone' between market adjustments and recovery. The stock market still depends on many variables such as the Fed's monetary policy, system liquidity and the corporate bond market, foreign investment flows, exchange rate fluctuations and gold prices.

The State Securities Commission has implemented solutions to upgrade the securities market, including improving the legal system, transparency and market professionalisation, helping to attract more foreign investment capital and enhancing the position of Việt Nam's stock market. Securities market upgrades could have the most positive impact on the country's economic development.

The VIX50 ranking is the result of objective scientific research by Vietnam Report, based on the media coding method — analysing press data in the media combined with market research.

According to Vietnam Report's media coding analysis, from April 2023 to March 2024, the five topics appearing most often in the media relating to public enterprises remain the same as last year. These include stocks, financial/business results, image/PR/scandals, product and administration.

Vietnam Report's survey also pointed out five industries with many potential stocks based on four main criteria: business results, reasonable valuation, ability to attract cash flow and advantages from macro factors like banking, information technology, retail, real estate, oil and gas.

Enterprises are rated as 'safe' in terms of information quality in communications by comparing the ratio of positive to negative information compared to the total amount of encrypted information. A 'safe' rating starts at 10 per cent, while the 'best' threshold is over 20 per cent. This year, Vietnam Report's research reported that 62.7 per cent of enterprises reached the 'safe' threshold and 48.2 per cent of enterprises reached the 'best' threshold.