Sixteen banks cut over 21.2 trillion VND for pandemic-hit customers

Illustrative image (Source: VNA)

Sixteen commercial banks cut over 21.24 trillion VND (936 million USD) of loan interest for COVID-19-hit customers from July 15 to December 31, 2021, surpassing their commitment by 5.13 percent, the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) reported on February 9.

The Vietnam Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Agribank) made the sharpest reduction with over 5.51 trillion VND for more than 3.5 million customers.

It was followed by the Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Foreign Trade of Vietnam (Vietcombank), with 4.63 trillion VND for 269,644 customers; and the Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BIDV), over 4.12 trillion VND for 452,746 customers.

According to Deputy Governor of the SBV Dao Minh Tu, last year, the bank maintained the regulatory interest rates, creating favourable conditions for credit institutions to access the SBV capital at low costs.

Tu said that the 16 banks, which own 75 percent of the total outstanding loans of the economy, showed strong performance inrealising their commitments to reducing interest rates for pandemic-hit clients.

Earlier, the banks committed to cutting loan interests amounting to 20.6 trillion VND for customers.

Four State-run commercial banks continued to commit a 4-trillion-VND aid package for reducing loan interests and cutting all banking service fees for customers in localities undertaking social distancing in line with the Prime Minister’s Directive No. 16./.