1:53:09 PM | 16/9/2008
Commercial banks in Vietnam are still going ahead with plans to open more branches despite warnings of a fiercer competition, the Dau Tu Chung Khoan online newspaper reported.
Network of banks has reached communes and villages, said Nguyen Dai Lai, Deputy Director of the Banking Development Strategy Department under the State Bank of Vietnam
Lai added that HCM City has 500 wards, while it has 1,000 transaction points.
Lien Viet Bank, which now has two branches in HCM City and three in Hanoi after four months of operation, plans to have 17 transaction points nationwide by the end of 2008.
With a network of 132 transaction outlets and 3,000 staffs across Vietnam, Techcombank expects to have 170 transaction points by the end of the year.
After opening a lot of branches in Jun and Jul, VP Bank now has 132 branches and transaction offices. Eximbank reportedly has 70 transaction points. Habubank has announced a plan to raise the number of its transaction points to 40.
According to a director of a HCM City-based joint-stock bank, banks are now rushing to open more banks in an effort to conquer the market. Some branches have not been operating well, but banks do not want to close them.
He said the number of "banking streets" tends to increasing in both Hanoi and HCM City. In HCM City, Ben Chuong Duong and Nguyen Cong Tru are considered banking streets since they gathered a lot of bank transaction points.
Apart from Lang Ha street where has been housing around 8-10 bank branches, a newly-opened route in Hanoi, Kim Lien-O Cho Dua, has become a banking street with nearly 20 branches and transaction points.
As of August 2008, Vietnam had five state-owned banks with 4,000 branches, five joint-venture banks, 36 joint-stock banks, 44 foreign bank branches, one central credit fund with 30 branches in 25 provinces and cities and 998 local credit funds. (Securities Investment)
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