Over the last few days, some banks have adjusted short-term deposit rates by 0.1-0.2 percent.
Due to the maturity of savings book worth 500 million dong, Mai came to a branch of a joint stock bank in Nguyen Thi Minh Khai street, District 1 to renew. Instead of enjoying the interest rate of 5.9 percent for 6-month term, the new savings rate decreased to 5.6 percent/annum only. “As such, instead of receiving 2.4 million dong monthly interest, now the interest is just 2.3 million dong”, she said.
This is the general trend of banks. Accordingly to the latest deposit rates announced by Saigon Thuong Tin Joint Stock Commercial Bank on June 15, new deposits for 2-month term only yield an interest rate of 5.2 percent/annum instead of 5.3 percent/annum.
On June 12, Techcombank applied new interest rates towards declining trend in almost all terms at 0.1-0.3 percent. Specifically, for 1-2 month terms, the interest rate was 4.6 percent/annum, down 0.2 percent; for 3-5 month term, the interest rate was 4.75 percent/annum, down 0.2 percent. Of which, 6-11 month terms fell 0.3 percent, to 5.6 percent/annum. Currently, Techcombank’s highest interest rate is 6.4 percent for terms from 12 months and above.
Earlier, Vietnam Export Import Bank Eximbank slightly reduced deposit rates by 0.1-0.2 percent/annum. In addition, many large banks such as Vietcombank, BIDV, Vietinbank, etc. also lowered interest rates.
A er of Vietcombank said the aforementioned move is mainly to restructure banks’ mobilised capital sources more appropriately.
Deputy general director of a joint stock bank in the South said that the economy is stable, and inflation is still low, so opportunities to reduce interest rates still remain. Banks still have room to continue cutting interest rates.
This year, banks are also limited with credit room with the growth rate of 12-14 percent. Though it is just half of the year now, banks have achieved credit growth of 8-9 percent, so credit growth must be slowed down. Therefore, gradually cutting deposit rates is the best way for banks to save costs.
Meanwhile, according to an economist, the deposit rate reduction shows that banks are having relatively abundant capital. In May, the stock market witnessed many declining sessions. The declining trend of the real estate market causes the cash flow to return to banking system more. Besides, the fact that some banks raise their equity via IPOs also supported deposit rates to go down.
“The reduction of mobilised interest rate this time is also considered as the way for banks to reduce lending rates for businesses”, he said.
Since the beginning of this year, the State Bank affirmed that it has always followed the developments of the market, regulate monetary policy flexibly, creating favourable conditions to keep interbank interest rates at low level. Thereby, the regulator creates favourable conditions to stabilise deposit rates and reduces the pressure on lending rates of credit organisations while ensuring the targets of stabilising exchange rate and increasing the State’s foreign exchange reserve.
