Transaction at Vietcombank (Photo VNA) Hanoi (VNA) - In contrast to Vietcombank’s move to cut deposit interestrate a week ago, two other large State-owned commercial banks -- Vietinbank andBIDV -- this week announced they were raising the rate.
According toBIDV’s latest interest rate list, the bank is offering interest rate of 4.8 percentper year for one and two-month deposits, up 0.5 percentage points from theprevious list.
The rise wasalso seen for three-month deposits, up from 4.8 percent to 5.2 percent per year.
Vietinbankalso made a similar move, however, it was applicable for medium-term deposits.The bank raised the rate for six and nine-month deposits from 5.5 percent and5.7 percent to 5.8 percent per year and 12-month deposits from 6.5 percent to6.8 percent per year.
In contrast,earlier, Vietcombank cut the rate for all terms by 0.1 percentage points,making its deposit interest rate the lowest in the banking system.
Vietcombank’smove is unexpected in the context that capital demand often rises sharplyduring the latter months of the year.
According toVietcombank, it cut the rate as its capital source is relatively abundant,adding that despite the low rate, the amount of deposits to the bank hasremained high thanks to its good reputation.
Commentingon the move, banking expert Nguyen Tri Hieu said the change in deposit interestrates among the banks probably comes from different capital needs.
Some banksreduced the deposit interest rates to restructure their capital source, whileothers increased the rates due to strong demand for loans at the end of theyear, he said.
Besidesthis, the credit growth target for the banking industry this year is over 20 percent,however, it grew by only 13.6 percent until the end of October. It means bankswill have to accelerate in the last two months of the year to meet the target,according to Hieu.
In theinter-bank market, liquidity in the banking system also reduced over the pastfew weeks, pushing the inter-bank rate to a four-month high.
A report onthe currency market by SSI Retail Research showed that inter-bank interestrates have maintained an upward trend for a month with a strong increase.
In the pastweek, the rate increased significantly by 20-34 basis points for all terms.Specifically, overnight rates increased by 26 basis points to 1.3 percent,exceeding the 1 percent threshold for the first time after four months.
According toSSI’s analysts, similar to the same period in 2016, these developments are notsurprising because liquidity demand will continue to rise as the peak season atthe end of the year is approaching.
On the OpenMarket Operation, the central bank last week issued bills worth 1.9 trillion VND(83.7 million USD) against 11 trillion VND in the previous week, while thematurity value was 12.2 trillion VND. -VNA
VNA
