Vietnam’s Premier Tells Central Bank to Review Property Loans

Vietnam’s Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh on Sunday instructed the central bank “to review real estate projects in order to take appropriate measures, such as delaying loan payments for some property companies,” to help ease a credit crunch in businesses.

The State Bank must also “order lenders to make efforts to cut operating costs to have more room for reductions in commercial lending interest rates for home-buyers and real estate projects,” he said in a statement on the government’s website.

The premier urged ministries including construction and finance to work on steps “to quickly remove obstacles for some ongoing projects to help them complete soon” to boost market liquidity, according to the statement.

Government officials must “overcome the fear of making mistakes, the fear of taking responsibility,” in order to quicken the process of approving projects, it said.

Source: Bloomberg