The 13th session of the Vietnam-Rusia Inter-Bank Cooperation Working Group was held in Ho Chi Minh City on November 10 under the co-chairmanship of Deputy Governor Nguyen Thi Hong of the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) and Deputy Governor Dmitry Skobelkin of the Central Bank of Russian Federation (Bank of Russia).
At the meeting, the two sides exchanged their views on economic developments and the situations of banking sectors of the two countries. The representative from the Bank of Russia highly appreciated the achievements that the SBV has obtained in macro-economic stabilization and the management of monetary policy as well as its effort in restructuring the banking sector and resolving NPLs.
In regard to the cooperation in the banking sector, the two sides reviewed the implementation of agreements in 12th session of the Working Group. The two sides acknowledged the impacts of negative fluctuations in the international financial market and other external factors on inter-bank cooperation between the two countries. However, the situations of the banking sector of the two countries and the orientation of strengthening the comprehensively strategic relation between Vietnam and Russia contributed to enhancing the cooperation of commercial banks and payment systems of the two countries. Over the past time, commercial banks of the two countries continued to strengthen the establishment of correspondent relation and correspondent account opening. The bilateral payments of the two banking systems continued to increase. Commercial banks of the two countries also enhanced to get access and participate in sponsoring for Vietnam – Russia cooperation projects. Especially, commercial banks in Vietnam and Russia, of which BIDV and VTB are pioneers, have formulated and implemented several measures of improving the utilization of domestic currencies in bilateral payments.
On the basis of reviewing the results of the previous sessions and recommendations, the two sides made agreements on orientations and specific measures to expand the inter-bank cooperation in the coming time. Commercial banks of the two countries will continue strengthening the development and provision of payment and credit products and services to meet the settlement and investment demand of enterprises of the two countries. In regard to bank card payment connecting, the two sides agreed to enhance the task of information and communication as well as the provision of bank card payment products and money transfer services in each country. With the support from the central banks of the two countries, commercial banks will implement pilot bilateral payment products and services in domestic currencies in order to assess the demand, advantages and difficulties in the implementation and outline measures of handling and expanding payment in domestic currencies for the next period. Moreover, the two sides committed to closely coordinate with each other in multilateral cooperation through activities of International Investment Bank (IIB) in Moscow.
Closing the session, the two sides approved and signed the meeting minutes for serving as the basis for implementing agreed measures to strengthen the cooperation between the two countries. The next session of the Working Group will be organized in Russia in 2016 under the chairmanship of the Bank of Russia.
LH