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The disparity between credit growth and deposit growth is creating a fierce underlying deposit raising race among commercial banks.

HÀ NỘI — While the capital market is underdeveloped, the banking system is burdened with the responsibility of supplying capital beyond its actual capacity, causing a fierce deposit raising competition and putting heavy pressure on the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV)’s monetary policy management.

Việt Nam’s economic development strategy for the 2026-2030 period sets an ambitious GDP growth target of 10 per cent or more per year.

According to detailed calculations from BIDV Research, to achieve this goal, the required average investment capital will be around US$250-260 billion per year. Looking further ahead to 2045, the economy's capital needs could reach $500 billion per year.

However, the Vietnamese economy still relies heavily on bank credit, with this channel consistently accounting for 50-60 per cent of the total capital supply.

Meanwhile, long-term capital channels such as the corporate bond market only account for a modest 3-6 per cent, and the stock market contributes about 10-18 per cent.

Phạm Xuân Hòe, former deputy director of the Institute of Banking Strategy, said that banks are simultaneously burdened with three heavy responsibilities: acting as payment intermediaries, providing short-term capital and financing medium- and long-term capital.

The consequence of this situation is that the balance sheets of the banking system are constantly overloaded, he noted.

Currently, about 80 per cent of deposits in Việt Nam have maturities of less than 12 months, while medium- and long-term loans once accounted for up to 47 per cent of total outstanding loans.

According to SBV data, as of June 15, credit growth reached 6.35 per cent, but deposit growth only reached 4.3 per cent. This 2 per cent gap forces banks to attract deposits in a variety of ways.

The disparity between credit and deposit growth is creating a fierce race to raise deposits among commercial banks. Meanwhile, depositors are easily misled by the varying interest rates offered.

While the listed interest rate on banks’ websites for a six-month term is only around 6 per cent per year, customers can actually receive 9-10 per cent per year through special conditions related to balances or certificates of deposit.

At one private bank, customers depositing VNĐ200 million or more are offered an interest rate of 8.5 per cent per year. Some even offered 9 per cent for deposits of VNĐ1 billion or more.

Chairman of Vietcombank’s board of directors Nguyễn Thanh Tùng pointed out the obstacles related to the imbalance of capital sources. According to Vietcombank's calculations, to achieve 10 per cent GDP growth, the investment rate needs to reach 40 per cent of GDP, but the average domestic savings rate is currently only 36.5 per cent.

If the growth of unofficial sectors is excluded, the accumulated domestic capital deficit is even more severe.

Tùng confirmed that his bank always adheres to directives on interest rate levels, so raised capital is currently insufficient to meet growth needs.

Although Vietcombank's loan-to-deposit ratio is below 70 per cent, a safe level compared to the SBV's 80 per cent ceiling, the bank still warned that there will not be enough capital for large projects in the future.

Tùng proposed raising capital from external sources by allowing the Ministry of Finance to issue international bonds to leverage national prestige and obtain the best possible interest rates.

He also expressed a desire for the capital market, especially the corporate bond market, to develop more rapidly.

The current size of Việt Nam's corporate bond market is only equivalent to about 10 per cent of GDP, significantly lower than other countries in the region such as Thailand and Malaysia.

SBV Governor Phạm Đức Ấn admitted that pressure to raise capital is making the central bank’s interest rate management difficult.

When capital demand is high but raised capital is limited, rising deposit interest rates will cause higher lending interest rates, directly impacting enterprises. To alleviate this pressure, the SBV is working to prevent commercial banks from engaging in extreme competition for capital mobilisation.

As for long-term solutions, the governor said the SBV is studying expanding the scope of eligible foreign currency loans serving investment purposes, especially for import businesses.

In addition, the amended Law on Credit Institutions allows commercial banks to manage collateral assets for businesses issuing bonds. This is expected to be a breakthrough, because many investors are currently hesitant about the collateral assets of corporate bonds, such as real estate, or assets formed from borrowed capital.

Only when banks participate in this asset management process can the bond market develop enough to alleviate the burden of medium- and long-term capital requirements in the banking system.

Vietnam’s current and future industrial expansion requires that industrial parks play a greater role in boosting productivity, resilience, and self-reliance.

The global economy is entering a period of heightened uncertainty, with increasingly rapid, complex, and unpredictable developments. Several international organizations have forecast that global economic growth will slow markedly in 2026 compared to 2025. Against this backdrop, countries are not only diversifying trade and investment relationships but also accelerating efforts to build more self-reliant economies supported by resilient and adaptable production capacity.

FDI continues to favor destinations that offer political and macro-economic stability, modern digital and energy infrastructure, strong connectivity, and manufacturing ecosystems capable of adapting to supply chain shifts, digital transformation, and the green transition. In this environment, Vietnam has strengthened its position as one of the region’s leading investment destinations through consistent and effective macro-economic policies.

The 14th National Party Congress set a strategic objective of achieving double-digit annual GDP growth during 2026-2030, with the goal of becoming a developing country with a modern industrial base by 2030. This direction was reinforced in Conclusion No. 18-KL/TW, issued on April 2, 2026, which identified industry as the primary engine of economic growth. The industrial and construction sector is targeted to expand by 12.3 per cent annually during 2026-2030, while manufacturing is expected to average 12.4 per cent annual growth.

Future industrial expansion, however, will be driven by a new development model centered on science and technology, innovation, higher value-added production, digitalization, green transformation, and deeper integration into global value chains. Achieving these objectives will require Vietnam’s industrial parks (IPs) and economic zones to be fundamentally repositioned, not only in terms of function and development model but also in the quality of investment they attract. Their role will increasingly be to support modern production ecosystems while enhancing productivity, resilience, and economic self-reliance.

Redefining industrial growth

IPs serve as the foundation for developing industrial clusters and integrated manufacturing ecosystems. Concentrating businesses within shared infrastructure reduces transaction costs, improves logistics efficiency, shortens project implementation timelines, and promotes greater specialization.

When fully connected with seaports, airports, railways, logistics hubs, research institutions, universities, and service-oriented urban areas, IPs become critical links in regional and global production networks. Stronger coordination between IPs in different localities would not only deepen regional integration but also redistribute manufacturing activities more efficiently and create new economic corridors.

IPs also remain one of Vietnam’s most important tools for attracting higher-quality FDI. Politburo Resolution No. 10-NQ/TW, issued on June 8, 2026, sets a target of integrating around 10,000 domestic companies into the value chains of foreign-invested enterprises (FIEs), including 500-1,000 Tier-1 suppliers. The development of IPs provides an important mechanism for implementing this strategy, by prioritizing investment projects involving advanced technologies, R&D, workforce training, and stronger links with domestic suppliers.

At the same time, IPs provide an ideal environment for implementing digital and green transformation. Digitalized management systems integrating land, construction, environmental, and energy data can streamline administrative procedures, lower compliance costs, improve incident response, monitor energy efficiency, facilitate data sharing, and strengthen real-time oversight.

Industrial symbiosis - where one company’s waste or byproducts become another company’s production inputs - can also help manufacturers meet increasingly stringent sustainability requirements in export markets. Successful international examples include Denmark’s Kalundborg industrial symbiosis model, South Korea’s transformation of the Ulsan industrial cluster, and Japan’s Kawasaki Eco-Town circular economy initiative.

Policy reforms

Vietnam has already introduced a series of important policies supporting IP development. Beyond the industrial development priorities established by the 14th National Party Congress and Conclusion No. 18, Resolution No. 29-NQ/TW, adopted in November 2022, calls for the development of large-scale modern eco-industrial parks (eco-IPs), expanded railway connections linking IPs with economic zones, airports, and seaports, and the development of coastal eco-IPs integrated with urban areas and major marine economic centers. It also encourages the industrial park-urban-service model.

These policy directions have been translated into concrete legal reforms. Government Decree No. 35/2022/ND-CP established the legal framework for a diverse range of IP models, including specialized IPs, supporting IPs, eco-IPs, high-tech IPs, and integrated industrial park-urban-service developments, while promoting industrial symbiosis.

The Law on Investment 2025 further decentralizes investment approval authority and introduces special investment procedures designed to accelerate project implementation.

More recently, under Official Letter No. 4551/NHNN-CSTT, dated May 29, 2026, the State Bank of Vietnam allowed credit institutions to exclude additional lending to IPs and export processing zones from real estate credit growth calculations in 2026 when monitoring lending limits. This measure is intended to facilitate greater financing for industrial infrastructure development.

Four priorities

Going forward, Vietnam should focus on four key policy priorities to accelerate IP development.

First, industrial infrastructure development should be aligned with major structural transitions, particularly through regulatory sandboxes that support the green and circular economy. In the digital era, data should be treated as strategic infrastructure alongside transportation, energy, and logistics networks, providing the foundation for smart governance, resource optimization, and higher-value business services. Wider adoption of AI, big data, the Internet of Things (IoT), and other digital technologies should improve infrastructure management, energy efficiency, environmental performance, and overall competitiveness, while cybersecurity and data protection must remain integral to the digital transformation process.

Second, policy should shift from expanding the number of IPs to improving their quality and effectiveness. As global supply chains are reconfigured and competition for investment intensifies, success will depend less on attracting more projects than on attracting high-quality investment capable of transferring technology, driving innovation, and strengthening links with domestic enterprises, thereby moving Vietnam higher up global value chains.

Third, investment promotion and incentive policies should evolve in line with Politburo Resolution No. 10 by moving away from input-based incentives toward performance-based support tied to investors’ commitments. This approach should encompass the full project lifecycle while encouraging stronger cooperation between foreign investors and domestic businesses.

Fourth, IPs should become more specialized and better integrated into value chains, evolving into comprehensive manufacturing ecosystems that connect anchor manufacturers, supplier networks, logistics centers, research and innovation institutions, workforce training facilities, financial services, and industrial support services within a coordinated development framework.

(*) Mr. Nguyen Duc Hien is Vice Chairman of the Central Commission for Policy and Strategy (CCPS), and Chairman of the CCPS Scientific Council.

Online retail sales across major e-commerce platforms grew by more than 40% year-on-year in the first half of 2026, or three times the pace of Vietnam's overall retail sector growth.

A report by e-commerce data analytics platform Metric said the four major multi-category online marketplaces (Shopee, TikTok Shop, Lazada, and Tiki) saw gross merchandise value (GMV) grow by 38-52%.

Together, they hosted 613,900 stores, whose GMV was VND291.6 trillion (US$11.07 billion) and who sold more than 2.18 billion products, up 41% and 12%.

That means consumers spent an average of VND1.6 trillion a day to buy 12 million products, with beauty, fashion, home and living, groceries and food, and household appliances accounting for the largest share.

Popular brands have benefited from the rise of e-commerce. Audio equipment retailer JBL, for example, said its second-quarter sales on Lazada doubled from a year earlier.

A JBL Vietnam spokesperson said online channels not only generate high traffic and help the brand reach more customers, but also provide an effective platform for promotional campaigns targeting younger consumers.

Online accounted for 10% of overall retail sales, which exceeded VND2.94 quadrillion during the half, up 12.5% from a year earlier, according to data from the General Statistics Office.

Online retail’s rapid expansion has been partly attributed to the effect of livestreaming. A recent online survey by market researcher Q&Me found that livestream shopping has become the primary purchasing channel for online shoppers, accounting for 67% of their online spending.

Speaking at a seminar last month, Ta Van Thanh, CEO of footwear retailer Nesty, said more than half of the brand's sales on TikTok Shop comes from livestreaming. The company plans to expand its partnerships with content creators this year, he added.

Discounts also encourage many consumers to choose online shopping over brick-and-mortar stores. Q&Me said 82% of surveyed consumers said discounts were a key factor influencing their purchase decisions, as livestream-exclusive vouchers and limited-time promotions encouraged immediate buying decisions.

During Lazada's June 6 promotional campaign, its GMV rose 276% from an average day.

Delivery speed also plays a key role. Shopee said merchants offering express delivery within one hour or four hours recorded order growth of up to 130% compared with sellers who did not.

The platform said it would continue investing in operational infrastructure and expanding logistics partnerships to reduce delivery times.

But both Shopee and TikTok Shop have raised their fees for merchants, forcing some sellers to hike their prices in turn. Following sellers’ complaints, the National Competition Commission has requested the platforms to make a report on the impact of their higher fees.

Tran Lam, an online sales training expert, said the market is gradually moving beyond the "cash-burning" phase, which means sellers now need to prioritize improving business efficiency.

"Costs continue to rise on the platforms but consumers still expect lower prices, faster delivery, and more promotions."

Content creator Hoang Van Khoa, better known as PewPew on social media, said building a multi-platform ecosystem – developing each piece of content into multiple formats and distributing it across channels ranging from Shopee to Facebook and Instagram – has been key to his success.

"Through this approach, my content now consistently attracts more than 30 million views each month."

Metric advised merchants to develop product portfolios based on search trend data, price segmentation, and seasonal demand rather than intuition.

It also recommended improving product quality, images, and information while combining advertising, promotions, livestreaming, affiliate marketing, and social media content to broaden customer reach.

Sarah Nguyen, commercial director of Shopee Vietnam, said e-commerce is entering a new phase of development as consumers increasingly expect better experiences, greater personalization, and higher levels of trust.

She said this would require platforms to invest more in artificial intelligence, infrastructure, and solutions that deliver seamless shopping experiences while expanding merchants' access to buyers.