Banks spend trillions of VND in preferential interest rates for customers (Photo: VietnamPlus)
Hanoi (VNA) – Although banks’ reduction of lending interest rates has not satisfied demand of businesses, the move has brought positive signs in the economy.
After the SBV cut regulatory interest rates, commercial banks have also lowered deposit interest rates and introduced preferential loan packages to stimulate credit demand.
Over the past days, deposit interest rates have decreased by between 1% - 2% per annum. Most commercial banks have listed their saving interest rates at 8% -9% per annum with some even lower.
Credit insitutions that reduced savings interest rates most recently include VPBank, VIB, Sacombank, SHB, HDBank, VietABank, Oceanbank, PVCombank, VietBank, PGBank, Viet Capital Bank, NCB, Kienlongbank, DongABank, Saigonbank. Currently, there are only two banks that offer interest rates above 9% per annum, which are ABBank (9.1%) and SCB (9%).
Compared to the peak period at the end of 2022, when there was a time the interest rate was up to 12% a year, the savings interest rate has dropped sharply.
In the interbank market, interest rates have also fallen sharply because the liquidity of banks is abundant. Specifically, the overnight interest rate is about 1.14% per annum; about 1.5%-2.4% per annum for terms from 1-2 weeks, 4.4% per annum for one-month term, 6.74% per annum for three-month term, and 8.1% per annum for six-month term. These are the lowest levels since mid-July 2022.
Illustrative image (Photo: VietnamPlus)
Reducing mobilisation interest rates is considered as an important factor for commercial banks to cut costs, thus reducing lending interest rates while supporting economic recovery.
Following a series of instructions to reduce lending interest rates, commercial banks have announced many credit packages with preferential interest rates from 7% per annum a year to meet the capital needs for production and business.
Notably, the “Big Four” State-run banks in term of the largest asset holders among Vietnamese banks, namely Agribank, BIDV, Vietcombank and VietinBank, have introduced credit packages with a combined value of 370 trillion VND (15.6 billion USD) and 500 million USD with preferential interest rates lower than those of normal loans.
Other banks also offer credit packages credit with preferential interest rates.
Recently, BacABank has said that it will allocate 5 trillion VND for business loans to support individual customers, with interest rates lower than normal from 0.3% to 0.5% per annum for short-term loans in diverse industries and fields. VIB has also announced a reduction of up to 2% a year in business loan interest rates for individual customers and micro enterprises. OCB will carry out a credit package of 1 trillion VND, allowing small and medium-sized enterprises to borrow capital with interest rates down to 2% compared to normal.
BacABank spends 5 trillion VND to support business for individual customers (Photo: VietnamPlus)
Expert Can Van Luc predicted that the interest rate reduction trend will continue in the near future, especially when the SBV has just decided to reduce some types of regulatory interest rates.
Luc noted that interest rates have decreased by 1%-2% since the beginning of the year. He expected the interest rates to drop further by 0.5%-1% a year, returning to the levels before the wave of raising interest rates at the end of 2022.
Many banks also said they are planning to further reduce interest rates for priority areas, after the SBV decided to lower the ceiling on short-term loans. This has created conditions for businesses to access preferential capital to expand production and business.
Although the move to reduce lending rates by banks has not fully met the needs of businesses, experts believe that this move has brought a very positive signal to the whole economy. This will create the basis and premise for all commercial banks to lower lending interest rates in the coming time, not only in priority areas, but also in other industries in the economy./.
