Metro Star enters HKEX (Hong Kong Stock Exchange)
Currently, to be listed on the main market of HKEX, a company must have a minimum market capitalization of 500 million HKD (over 1,500 billion VND), a minimum net profit of 45 million HKD (over 140 billion VND) over the two-year monitoring period, and 35 million HKD (over 108 billion VND) for the third business year. Additionally, a significant portion of the management board must remain unchanged during the monitored three-year business period.
Meanwhile, Metro Star has a charter capital of 1,200 billion VND. The company currently holds assets valued at up to 7,985 billion VND. Over the course of 18 years of development, Metro Star has consistently grown in terms of project scale, revenue, and profit. The project scale of the company has also continuously increased from 6,000 m2 in 2014 to 18,000 m2 in 2016, reaching a milestone of 252,000 m2 in 2023. The company’s revenue has similarly seen continuous growth, reaching 600 billion VND in 2017, expected to reach 6,000 billion VND in 2024, and is projected to officially hit 23,000 billion VND in 2027.
Moreover, Metro Star is showcasing a unique business model that has been carefully developed over the past 18 years – the Green TOD (Transit-Oriented Development) model along six metro lines in Ho Chi Minh City, a dynamic emerging economic region within ASEAN. The company is the first to pioneer a project chain along metro lines in Vietnam. This presents a highly advantageous factor for the company’s listing in Hong Kong, as the region is well-versed in understanding the potential and value of projects developed along metro stations.
Metro Star plans to develop over 50 Green TOD projects along the six metro lines in Ho Chi Minh City
The Green TOD project model is a connectivity and enhancement model between green transportation, such as electric trains, and green architectural structures, green operations, and clean energy utilization. This model is advanced on a global scale, aligning well with climate change adaptation, the Net-zero strategic direction, and the city’s goals outlined in Decree 98.
In the Metro Star project, the emphasis is on enhancing the use of green public transportation, specifically electric trains, for movement throughout the city. This model is designed to calculate a reduction of 50% in the number of cars and motorcycles in each area for each project, averaging around 10,000 motorcycles and 100 cars reduced for each project.
As the first enterprise to develop a chain of over 50 projects along six metro lines, Metro Star has leveraged its unique advantages to attract international investment. The Green TOD model of Metro Star shares many similarities with successful Green TOD models implemented in developed countries such as Japan, Hong Kong, and Singapore. In these models, real estate prices are measured by the proximity to metro stations and electric trains. The shorter the commuting time to a metro station, the higher the property value, and vice versa. Therefore, the international community highly values Metro Star’s Green TOD project chain model.
Vincent Choo Wing Sung, the Investment Director of Metro Star, shares about the international community’s high regard for the Green TOD project chain model.
Moreover, Metro Star almost has no debt, including both bank loans and funds raised through bond channels. This factor allows Metro Star’s assets, valued at 7,985 billion VND, to operate at full capacity and create significant potential for expanding capital scale. With the potential of the current land fund and a clean debt structure, the company can easily seek substantial credit to finance development plans and future projects. This is particularly advantageous amid a backdrop of various policy measures facilitating the inflow of funds into business operations with extremely favorable interest rates.
In addition, financial health and transparency have been confirmed by the Credit Information Center (CIC), along with years of auditing activities by Ernst & Young. This dual assurance ensures that the company complies with the stringent legal and ownership regulations set by HKEX.
At the current juncture, finding a real estate entity that converges all the factors to create a truly impactful international IPO, as seen in the case of Metro Star, is highly rare.
