By the end of 2017, the total assets of the entire Vietnam’s credit institution (CI) system officially exceeded 10,000 trillion dong, up by 17.62 percent compared to 2016. While the Commercial Joint Stock Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development of Vietnam (Agribank) and Commercial Joint Stock Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BIDV) recorded total assets exceeding 1,000 trillion dong from 2016, Commercial Joint Stock Bank for Industry and Trade of Vietnam (VietinBank) and Commercial Joint Stock Bank for Foreign Trade of Vietnam (Vietcombank) joined the group with Agribank and BIDV in 2017.
As the ranking in equity has seen much changes and the gap between top private banks with state-owned banks in terms of charter capital is narrowing down, the gap in total assets remains significant. The total asset growth of state-owned commercial banks is also higher, with over 18.34 percent in 2017 while that was 16.69 percent for private commercial banks.
Considering the group of state-owned banks, BIDV is currently having the largest total assets in the system with over 1.2 trillion dong, followed by VietinBank and Vietcombank, with total assets of respectively 1.09 trillion dong and 1.03 trillion dong.
Following BIDV, VietinBank and Vietcombank, Saigon Commercial Joint Stock Bank (SCB) is currently the leading bank in the group of private banks in total assets. However, the difference between SCB and three major state-owned banks is still large as SCB’s total assets is 444 trillion dong, only equivalent to 43 percent of Vietcombank’s.
The total assets size of state-owned banks has long been still leading the entire system. By the end of 2017, excluding Agribank (which is not a joint stock bank), three major banks including BIDV, VietinBank and Vietcombank recorded total assets of 3,330 trillion dong, accounting for 46 percent of the total assets of the system. The total assets of these three banks are equivalent to up to the total assets of up to 15 private banks.
Although the gap in total assets is large, there is a fact that the group of private banks is getting better and better. Typically, the charter capital of Vietnam Prosperity Commercial Joint Stock Bank (VPBank) is only equivalent to 46 percent of BIDV’s, and its total assets are only equivalent to 23 percent of BIDV’s, VPBank’s profit is only 670 billion less than BIDV’s.
The 2018 business plans released recently of some banks show the strong expectation to breakthrough of private banks. If the plans are realised, the profit ranking will perhaps be changed and the top three names will not only be Vietcombank, VietinBank, and BIDV.
