The deposit interest rate for Vietnamese dong will be reduced to 9 percent per year from the current 11 percent from next week, Governor of the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) Nguyen Van Binh said at a National Assembly meeting on June 7.

Binh said that the Prime Minister approved the SBV's rate cut, which it decided on with 14 commercial banks at a meeting last week.

On June 7 morning, dong interest rates at the large Vietcombank and the Asian Commercial Bank (ACB) declined unexpectedly on most long and short term deposits after a long time at 11 percent.

The highest deposit rate at Vietcombank was reduced to 10.5 percent per year, applied only for one-month terms. The rate of 10 percent was applied for two- and three-month terms while those with six and 24-month terms got a rate of only 9.5 percent.

The interest rate at ACB also reduced to 10.8 percent for two, three, six and nine-month terms. However, the bank still kept the ceiling rate of 11 percent for 12 and 13-month terms.

Commercial banks often offer the interest rate at the highest level allowed by the SBV to attract depositors.-VNA