Vietnam

It is the first time a foreign bank in Vietnam, namely Hong Leong Bank, can make ATM transactions under the Smartlink system without any fees.

OceanBank and Hanoi Broadcasting Television Services Co signed the cooperation contracts for charge collection services for Hanoi Cable TV subscribers. At the same time, OceanBank also inked contract with VTC Intercom to offer electrical paid-in services for the online shopping website of paygate.vtc.vn. With such services, the Hanoi Cable TV subscribers and users of online shopping website at paygate.vtc.vn will have another channel for making periodical payment every month.

Inflation is out of control so the The State Bank of Vietnam has limited credit growth of banks to 20% in 2011.

The State Bank of Vietnam granted a license for Busan Ltd Bank to open its representative office in HCM City.

The chief of Shinhan Bank named Vietnam among its options for expansion into Southeast Asia in an effort to boost its revenue sources. "I believe that Shinhan Bank could have competitive edges in China, Japan and Vietnam, into which the bank has made inroads relatively earlier," said Suh Jin-won, president of Shinhan Bank. "If we are able to do the current credit card business well in Vietnam, we could get an explosive boost from it. ... We are considering expanding our presence in emerging countries. We are open to various options, including takeovers." Suh earlier said the bank plans to make forays into one or two countries in Asia this year as the local banking markets have almost been saturated. Indonesia and Malaysia are among potential options. Shinhan plans to increase the portion of income generated from its overseas operations to around 10 percent of its total earnings by 2015, up from the current 3 percent.  

Strategic shareholders Electricity of Vietnam and Maybank have committed long-term cooperation with ABBank.

Vietcombank officially offered the financial services on VCB-iB@nking with Korea Life Insurance Co Ltd.

Vietinbank signed a cooperation contract to jointly launch automatic toll collection service at non-stop toll station at Tan Son Nhat Airport, HCM City.

Vietinbank signed a cooperation contract with the Laos Development Bank for a number of financial areas like client services, credit card-issuing and trade supports.

ANZ today opened a Signature Priority Banking branch in Hanoi, providing greater convenience to its affluent retail banking customers in Vietnam.

Experts from six different nations gathered in Saigon Opera House last 13 May.

Tin Nghia Bank has been allowed by the State Bank of Vietnam to provide foreign exchange services.

VietinBank-CTG signed an agreement with HDBank to jointly launch Mastercard international credit card.

ABBank estimated to reach accumulative pre-tax profit of 189 billion dong and total asset value of 34.969 trillion dong by end of April.

The State Bank of Vietnam has allowed the ING Bank N.V. of the Netherlands to open a Representative Office in Hanoi. To be called the ING Bank N.V. – Hanoi Representative  Office, it will have an operational duration of five years.

Many small-scale commercial joint stock banks in Vietnam have completed raising required authorised shareholder capital of at least VND3,000 billion. More have revealed new plans to raise the registered capital this year. Many small commercial banks have just completed raising the minimum required registered capital to VND3,000 billion and they actively prepare for new capital-raising plans which are scheduled to be done this year. Specifically, Housing Development Bank HD Bank will increase registered capital from VND3,000 billion to VND5,450 billion; TrustBank will hike its charter capital from VND3,000 billion to VND5,000 billion; and OceanBank will lift its capital from VND3,500 billion to VND5,000 billion.