Many companies offering money-transfer services are expected to easily fulfill their business targets for this year since inward remittances have increased significantly over the past few months.

Industry observers say that the trend is likely to continue in the remaining months of the year.

Trinh Hoai Nam , deputy director of Dong A Money Transfer, said overseas remittances through his company reached 600 million USD in the first seven months of the year, meeting 55 percent of its annual target of 1.1 billion USD.

His company will continue to improve quality of remittance payment and customer care services to better serve its customers, especially in the last few months of the year when inward remittances increase strongly, Nam said.

First half overseas remittances via Sacomrex, which belongs to the Sai Gon Thuong Tin Commercial Joint Stock Bank (Sacombank), topped 600 million USD for a 35 percent increase over the same period last year. It expects to see the annual figures exceed 1.2 billion USD.

Sacombank said it has implemented many measures like diversifying payment channels to facilitate remittances for both senders and receivers.

Besides traditional markets including the US , Australia and Canada , Eastern Europe and Asia have increasingly become important overseas remittance sources since many Vietnamese people are living and working in these regions, according to Sacombank.

Inward remittances through HCM City banks in the first seven months of the year topped 2.24 billion USD, an increase of nearly 28 percent compared to the same period last year, said Nguyen Hoang Minh, deputy director of the State Bank of Vietnam, HCM City chapter.

The figure is expected to reach 3.8 billion USD this year, up 18 percent over last year, Minh said.

The recovery of the world economy as well as better growth of Vietnam's economy have opened more business opportunities in Vietnam, and increasing numbers of overseas Vietnamese are transferring money to invest in their homeland, bankers said.

The increasing number of Vietnamese people going abroad for work has also helped increase the amount of overseas remittances.

Commercial banks have reported that the amount of dollars received through remittances and sold to them is higher than earlier because dollar prices at banks now equal prices on the open market.

They also expect that overseas remittances will increase in the last months of the year when many overseas Vietnamese send money home for the Lunar New Year./.