A consortium of international financial institutions led by the Netherlands Development Finance Co (FMO) has agreed to provide a credit line of 150 million USD to HCM City-headquartered Sacombank.

The bank signed on March 30 a memorandum of understanding for the financial assistance with FMO and other lending institutions from Norway, France, Belgium and Germany.

The institutions are: Norfund (Norwegian Investment Fund for Developing Countries); Proparco (Promotion and Participation for Economic Cooperation under the French Development Agency – AFD); BIO (Belgian Development Finance Institution); and DEG, which specialises in financing investments of private companies in developing and transition countries, and is a member of the German government-owned KfW Group.

Disbursement of the credit facility, which has a term of 10 years, will be made in two tranches. The first tranche of 95 million USD will be disbursed in the second quarter of this year and the second one of 55 million USD at the year-end, said FMO senior investment director Jurgen Rigterink.

Sacombank was chosen to receive the credit facility because of its leading position in Vietnam's banking sector, having a charter capital of more than 9 trillion VND (450 million USD) and a network of 370 branches and transaction offices.

Sacombank has so far received similar support of around 300 million USD from FMO, Proparco, IFC, ADB and other international institutions./.