HCMC - Four state-owned commercial banks have agreed to further reduce interest rates following their meetings with the Government and the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV).

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh held a meeting with the SBV and state-owned commercial banks on credit growth yesterday in Hanoi, discussing the possibility of further lowering interest rates to prop up the economy. The four state-owned banks -- VietinBank, Vietcombank, BIDV and Agribank -- all agreed on this policy. The SBV, the central bank of the nation, will continue to support the liquidity of the banking system to help the banks lower interest rates. Recently, the Government and the SBV have come up with new policies to address difficulties in the real estate and corporate bond markets, such as increasing money supply, reducing interest rates and purchasing valuable papers and buying foreign currency to increase foreign exchange reserves. The SBV has lowered key interest rates twice since the beginning of the year, resulting in a 0.6% reduction in lending rates compared to the end of 2022. In the last two weeks of March, SBV announced decisions to cut key interest rates. Specifically, the refinancing and rediscount rates were reduced by one percentage point and 0.5 percentage point over the past month, respectively.