HCMC – Chief executives of domestic and foreign companies in Vietnam exuded an air of optimism last week when they discussed Vietnam’s future economic outlook. At a business luncheon organized in HCMC last Friday by the British Business Group Vietnam (BBGV) and the European Chamber of Commerce in Vietnam (EuroCham), guest speakers conceded there remained woes but said growth momentum had emerged... 

HCMC – The Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) is making an increasing important contribution to Asia, a region that the Indonesian Minister of Trade describes as a center of growth and gravity. “China and India are obviously very much on the radar… I think ASEAN should be the third growth center of Asia,” Mari Elka Pangestu told the closing ceremony of the World Economic... 

HCMC – Bad news from global stock markets affected to some extent the sentiment of local investors as the market took nosedive to below the 500 point-level. The VN-Index lost a significant 13.48 points, or 2.64% from the session earlier to close at 496.89. The market dropped right from the start before staging a six-point rally from 496 points to just over the 502-point level. However, those gains... 

The Vietnamese government has told the central bank to keep the country’s money supply growth target this year at around 20 percent to help control inflation, lowering it from a previous target of 28 percent. Consumer prices rose 9.46 percent in a year to March, the highest inflation rate in a year. Despite economists’ calls to raise policy rates, the Southeast Asian country has kept... 

HANOI – Vietnam’s central bank has injected VND10.7 trillion (US$617.2 million) into the banking system and could soon allow negotiable interest rates on short-term loans as it seeks ways to cut lending rates, the government said. The State Bank of Vietnam lent VND8.2 trillion under a 28-day term at a rate of 8 percent and VND2.5 trillion via seven-day funds at 7 percent late last... 

HCMC – Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Sinh Hung, speaking at a meeting in Hanoi on Monday with the country’s 63 provinces and cities and 27 leading state-owned companies, said the central bank would have to find ways to lower interest rates. Interest rates must be cut to acceptable levels, he told the video teleconference intended to deploy the Government’s emergency measures to ensure macro economic... 

Rising inflation will pose more of a challenge to Vietnamese authorities this year than the sizeable, but manageable, trade deficit, a Standard Chartered Bank official says. Tai Hui, head of the bank’s Southeast Asia research division based in Singapore, says in a report the risk of inflation is rising. The minimum wage for state employees will be raised by 12.3 percent on May 1. Two one-off devaluations... 

The government has allowed commercial banks to offer short term loans at negotiable interest rates to ensure enough credit for profitable projects, an official said Thursday. The State Bank of Vietnam will be responsible for taking measures to lower lending interest rates, chief of the government’s office Nguyen Xuan Phuc said at a press briefing in Hanoi. He was announcing new government guidance... 

HANOI – Vietnam’s January-March trade deficit is US$3.5 billion compared with a surplus of US$1.5 billion in Q1 of 2009, but it is not as bad as it looked, says Barclays Capital. The British banking institution Emerging Markets Research comments that at first glance the trade gap looks sizeable, but it should be seen in the context of US$2.5 billion of foreign direct investment (FDI) disbursements... 

Vietnam should lift the prohibition of trading gold on overseas accounts to encourage local lenders to mobilize the metal from Vietnamese residents, a local gold expert said. Arguing that such a move would boost the economy, Deputy Chairman of the Vietnam Gold Business Council and World Gold Council consultant Huynh Trung Khanh said most commercial banks offer gold deposit rates of less than one percent,...