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Rates hold steady, bank funds ample
Lending rates in Vietnam were steady this week and a big state-run bank started to sell short-term debt even though most banks still have ample funds, bankers said Monday.
Four state-run banks, Vietnam's top lenders, kept their overnight lending rates unchanged in the past week at 14-17 percent, against 16 percent in late August.
But the average lending rate rose marginally to 15.08 percent from 15.03 percent, and 12-month dong loans edged up to 18.38 percent from 18.31 percent last Monday, according to the inter-bank rate fixings compiled by Reuters that include offers from other banks.
The State Bank of Vietnam, the central bank, said its decision to triple the interest rate on banks' reserves against their dong deposits to 3.6 percent from last Monday has had a positive impact on market lending and made loans cheaper.
State-run banks and Vietcombank, the largest among Vietnam's partly private banks, have cut lending rates by between 0.5 and 1 percentage point, the central bank said in its weekly review.
Three bidders bought all of the three-year government bonds worth VND500 billion (US$30 million) auctioned last Friday on the Hanoi stock exchange at an annual yield of 16 percent, the exchange said.
The yield has eased slightly from 16.5 percent on three-year government debt sold to two investors on August 22.
In a clear sign of ample dong funds, investors were ready to deposit with the government even at a lower yield.
At the same Friday auction, investors bought two-year bonds worth VND265 billion, or 53 percent the total value on the State Treasury's offer, also at the annual yield of 16 percent, the exchange said.
Additionally, state-run BIDV, Vietnam's second-largest bank by assets, said it has started issuing certificates of deposit to raise dong funds over a two-month period ending on November 3, the fourth such move this year.
The Hanoi-based bank did not say how much it intended to raise from this issuance, but said in a statement to Reuters that it has raised VND14 trillion from the previous three issues of certificates of deposit.
On the dollar front, the central bank set the dollar/dong midpoint at VND16,499 per dollar Monday, down from VND16,495 per dollar last Monday and VND11 lower than a month ago.
"Foreign currency supply and demand remained stable in the past week," the central bank's review said, adding that banks listed their dollar/dong quotations below the ceiling.
Banks are allowed to trade dollar and dong within a 2 percent band from the midpoint set daily.
Thanhnien
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