National airline carrier Vietnam Airlines Company Limited (VNAL) completed the first leg of its 25% IPO sell-down. We believe VNAL is only suitable for strategic investors but not financial. With avg. auction price at 2.2x book value and FY13 EV/EBITDA of 11.7x (vs regional peers’ 1.1x and 9.8x respectively), VNAL is arguably pricey. Given timing uncertainty regarding post-IPO listing date, the purpose of this research is simply to throw up ideas to be explored closer to listing.