Removing capital difficulties for businesses

Mr. Nguyen Thac Quang, Director of the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) provincial branch, said: “From the beginning of 2024, the banking sector has promoted solutions to reduce lending interest rates according to the direction of the SBV, some priority economic sectors and sectors are maintained at 4.0%/year; for other normal production and business sectors, short-term interest rates are commonly 5-10.5%/year, medium and long-term interest rates commonly fluctuate between 6.5-13.5%/year. Compared to the end of 2023, the interest rate for normal production and business loans for current customers has decreased by 0.5-5.0%/year for all terms and decreased by 0.5-6%/year compared to June 19, 2023. Thereby, demonstrating the efforts of banks in implementing the direction of the State Bank, reducing mobilization interest rates, reducing operating costs, creating sources to reduce lending interest rates, supporting customers to access low-cost capital for production and business.

In addition, in order to contribute to supporting businesses and people to overcome the consequences caused by storm No. 3 and stabilize production and business, credit institutions have been actively and proactively implementing many solutions to remove difficulties for customers who have suffered losses, including solutions to exempt and reduce loan interest (for existing and new outstanding debts)... Many units have implemented new credit packages with lower interest rates from 0.5-2%/year depending on the level of damage of customers..."

Vietcombank Bac Ninh staff advise and support customers in borrowing capital for production and business. 

In particular, the state banks actively participates in regular dialogues with departments, branches and sectors to listen and promptly resolve difficulties for businesses. Commercial banks in the area are implementing many preferential credit packages such as the program "Accompanying corporate customers" of VietinBank and BIDV with a scale of VND 300,000 billion, supporting the development of small and medium enterprises. ACB also implemented a preferential credit package of VND 1,300 billion for FDI enterprises in 2024, helping to increase capital support for foreign-invested enterprises in the area...

Commercial banks regularly hold dialogue conferences with businesses. Up to now, new loans under a number of credit programs have reached VND 107,850 billion in turnover, with outstanding loans of VND 70,682 billion with 4,609 customers having outstanding loans (including 2,849 corporate customers and 1,760 other customers). The banking system in the area has continued to make efforts to effectively implement credit programs for industries and sectors: Outstanding loans for the agricultural and rural sectors reached VND 45,989 billion, accounting for 26.4% of total outstanding loans, with 119,084 customers having outstanding loans; Outstanding loans for small and medium enterprises reached VND 22,687 billion, accounting for 13% of total outstanding loans, with 2,441 enterprises having outstanding loans; Outstanding loans for the real estate sector reached VND26,432 billion, up 18.2% compared to the end of 2023, accounting for 15.2%...

However, in reality, some businesses still face difficulties in accessing capital due to not meeting the criteria, such as lack of collateral, being in bad debt status, or unfeasible business plans. Some other businesses, although gradually recovering, still face obstacles in financial capacity and do not have enough resources to pay off old debts... Commercial banks are preparing capital sources and preferential credit packages to serve the needs of businesses. However, it is recommended that businesses proactively develop feasible business plans and improve management capacity to take advantage of opportunities to access preferential capital./.