Stockbrokers to receive CAMEL rating                                     Brokerages on national stock exchanges will be rated according to new criteria offering greater transparency, under a draft classification produced by the Ministry of Finance (MoF) and the State Securities Commission (SSC).  According to the plan, companies will be rated under the CAMEL criteria; assessing capital adequacy (C), asset quality (A), management quality (M), earnings (E) and liquidity (L).  Currently, investors only have access to rankings for the top 10 companies on the two national stock exchanges, with no ratings assigned to the remaining 104 securities firms.  Each factor of the criteria accounts for a 20 percent weighting in the company's overall rating.  Companies with capital adequacy ratios (CAR) of 300 percent will receive the highest rating of 100 points; while CARs ranging from 180 to 300 percent will receive 80 points. Companies will lower CARs will receive progressively lower ratings.  Kim Long Securities (KLS), FPT Securities, Saigon Securities Inc (SSI) and HCM City Securities (HCM) are among the companies expecting 100 ratings in the CAR category.  First, receivables will be assessed to measure asset quality. Companies with total assets ratio less than 10 percent will receive 100 points, while a ratio of 75 percent can expect a zero point rating.  The rating will prove a challenge for brokerages, with many top 10 companies possessing a high proportion of high-margin loans and accounts receivables at the 20-30 percent level. Smaller firms will also be penalised, due to a high level of receivables comprising total assets.  Average revenue growth will reward stable growth but may face challenges posed by market volatility and seasonal trends affecting business operations and stock value.  During the first six months of this year alone, total revenue of securities-companies declined 30 percent over the same period last year. Notably, the top 10 brokerages all experienced falls in revenue due to slow share market growth and rising interest rates.  According to experts, brokerages will struggle to meet criteria on management quality due to a churn in high-level management and stiff requirements for company leaders to be working for at least 5 years to achieve a 100 point rating.  Additionally, a 100 point chairman is required to have at least 10 years of experience working in the sector.-VNA