Deposit rates ease from 14% ceiling (4/7)
04/07/2011 - 13 Lượt xem
In addition, in anticipating the downtrend of interest rates, banks set the deposit rate for longer terms lower than that for short terms. For example, at Saigon Commercial Bank, the deposit rate is 13.5% for six- to 13-month deposits, while savings of longer terms have the same rate of 13% per year.
At Techcombank, deposit rates range from 13.7% to 13.9% for one-week to three-month terms, while four- to six-month terms come with a rate of 13.5%. Meanwhile, Eximbank offers the highest rate of 13.85% per year for normal savings and 13.97% for certificates of deposit.
Currently, only special customers or those having big deposits can negotiate a higher deposit rate with banks while most individual customers depositing small amounts of money have to accept lower rates as quoted.
But the negotiated deposit rate remains high at certain banks, especially for customers with big sums. The deputy general director of a joint-stock bank said that the negotiated deposit rate at his bank had decreased a little bit these days, but it was still close to 20%.
“If the maximum rate I accepted one week ago was 20.5% per year, it is now only 19.5% per year, while some big banks have decreased their negotiated rate to 17.5%,” the source said.
He explained banks still maintained a high deposit rate because they wanted to keep existing customers who could immediately move to another bank that offered higher rates.
The interest rate on the inter-bank market has declined to around 16% per year now so banks cannot make gains from the inter-bank market like earlier, he said.
The downtrend of interest rates, however, is seen not strong in the rest of the year as high inflation is still a factor discouraging depositors. The Government has revised up the 2011 inflation target several times this year, from an initial 7% to 11.75% and then to 15%. On Thursday, the target was revised up to 17%.
Source: Saigon Times.
