City chairman Le Hoang Quan last week approved in principle to allow Saigon Construction Corporation, a local partner of the building’s joint-venture developer, to transfer its stake to the foreign partner, according to the city’s website. It is said the city authorities will meet with the foreign partner to negotiate conditions, including pricing.

The building has been invested by Saigon Metropolitan Tower Limited, a 40-year joint venture between Binh Minh Construction One-Member Co. under Saigon Construction Corporation and Saigon Metropolitan Limited of the British Virgin Islands.

When established in 1995 with registered capital of US$29 million, the local partner was Construction and Building Materials Co. After several changes, the project now has registered capital of US$49.7 million and its local partner is Binh Minh Co. with a 30% stake.

Located at 235 Dong Khoi Street in District 1, the Metropolitan Building was completed in 1997 as a 16-story building with 15,000 square meters of office space. It has attracted multi-national companies such as HSBC and Toyota.

* Broker and consultant Vietnam Finance Investment Co. (known as TigerInvest) has announced it successfully transferred an office building in HCMC owned by Viet Technology Joint Stock Company, VITEK, to another local company.

Accordingly, VITEK has signed a contract to transfer the 10-story building covering 4,350 square meters at 63A Vo Van Tan Street in District 3 to Bitexco Nam Long Manufacturing and Investment Joint Stock Co. The contract is valued at VND135 billion. TigerInvest specializes in supplying M&A package services, especially in real estate.

Last month, TigerInvest successfully transferred the Hoa Binh Tower of Hoa Binh Real Estate Construction and Trading Joint Stock Co. (HBC) to another local company. The transfer contract for Hoa Binh Tower, which covers 2,775 square meters in the city’s Saigon South, is worth nearly US$12 million.