HO CHI MINH CITY, April 17 (Xinhua) -- Vietnam's national flag carrier Vietnam Airlines has gained approval of the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE) to list its 1.4 billion shares on the southern bourse.

The carrier will move to HoSE from the Unlisted Public Company Market (UPCoM), and its market value on HoSE is approved at 14 trillion Vietnamese dong (nearly 608.7 million U.S. dollars), Vietnam News Agency reported on Wednesday.

Vietnam Airlines planned to switch to HoSE from UPCoM in 2018, but the decline of the stock market in the second half of 2018 made the firm delay its plan until now.

The national carrier sold 49 million shares, equal to 3.48 percent of the total, for 1.09 trillion Vietnamese dong (nearly 47.4 million U.S. dollars) at the initial public offering (IPO) in 2014.

In 2016, Japanese aviation firm ANA Holdings bought 8.8 percent of Vietnam Airlines' capital for 108 million U.S. dollars.

In 2018, Vietnam Airlines posted a record-high revenue of 96.8 trillion Vietnamese dong (roughly 4.2 billion U.S. dollars), up 17 percent on-year, and a pre-tax profit of 3.24 trillion Vietnamese dong (nearly 140.9 million U.S. dollars), up 34 percent.

Vietnam Airlines shares on UPCoM have increased by nearly a quarter since the end of last year, ending at 41,200 Vietnamese dong (roughly 1.8 U.S. dollars) per share on April 16.