Thao Quynh – Don't Be Afraid to Take Some Gains off the Table

  Thao Quynh has 15 years of experience in the financial service and investment industry. She was the investment portfolio manager for two European funds with US$280 million of assets under management. Prior to that, she worked as a financial analyst and research manager for leading brokerage houses in Vietnam. She started out with a university tuition loan to create the asset of knowledge and it is this knowledge that has given her financial security. She believes in diversifying across various asset classes and allocates about half of her wealth to investing in the stock market investments. Thao holds a Master’s Degree in International Business from SKEMA Business School in France and an MBA from the European Management Education Center in Vietnam. Today she is serving her country as an investment manager and portfolio strategy manager at Vietnam Holding Asset Management.    Vietnamese stock market booms in youthful exuberance   The year 2007 was a boom time for the relatively young Vietnamese stock market and everyone was excited about the kind of profitability in which returns of double or triple were quite normal.  The VN index chart had soared from around the 680 mark in late 2006 to its peak of around 1179 in March 2007. Several companies were trading at 70 times PE and 100 times PE and what is considered a bubble at that point of time.     [caption id="attachment_2621" align="aligncenter" width="403"] The VN index chart had soared from around the 680 mark in late 2006 to its peak of around 1179 in March 2007. The latter year was when naïve investor Thao started to invest and got caught up in the excitement and greed.[/caption]   Source: