Vietnam government to step up state firm sales

The Vietnamese government will accelerate privatisation of state-owned companies and will not rescue failing banks, Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Sinh Hung said on Thursday, signalling plans to loosen the state's grip on key parts of the economy.
Hung said that the "equitisation", or privatisation, of state-owed enterprises had been slow in recent years because of the economic downturn and sluggish stock markets, but he said the government would speed up the pace and even sell stakes in its biggest firms, known as economic groups. "If we can keep macroeconomic development at a rapid pace in the next five years, most big state-owned groups and companies will be equitised," he said. Investors have been eagerly awaiting the privatisation of select state-owned companies, like telecoms operator Mobifone, saying it will help improve the structure of the economy and give the country's stock markets more depth.