Vietnam’s State Treasury had deposited VND 379.05 trillion (US$14.58 billion) across state-owned banks BIDV, VietinBank, and Vietcombank as of end-March 2025 — more than 4 times higher than the same period last year and the highest since 2020, Dan Tri has reported.
Breakdown by bank:
- BIDV: VND 130.7 trillion (US$5.03 billion) — down from end-2024 but up 2.87x year-on-year.
- VietinBank: VND 127.0 trillion (US$4.88 billion) — down quarter-on-quarter but up VND 81.6 trillion (US$3.14 billion) year-on-year.
- Vietcombank: VND 121.3 trillion (US$4.66 billion) — up 1.56x from end-2024 and 36.5x year-on-year.
Interesting points in the article:
- The State Treasury uses both term and non-term deposits to maximise returns on idle public funds.
- Banks must publicly bid for term deposits under strict criteria, including asset size, equity, bad debt ratios, and performance.
- State-owned banks benefit from the selection criteria, which favour institutions with strong capital bases and low risk. Interest rate offers also affect bidding outcomes.
This move underscores how state-owned banks benefit from structural advantages in public capital allocation. This is relevant in that private sector development, which will likely require equal treatment of domestic private firms with SOEs and foreign invested firms, has been announced as a key policy moving forward.
See also: Vietnam’s Private Sector Development Push: Unpacked