Vietnam

Citi Vietnam’s mobile-first strategy empowers customers to do the majority of their banking needs remotely

Citi was also named Digital Bank of the Year in the Asia-Pacific as well as Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, South Korea, Thailand, Bahrain, and the UAE in The Asset’s Triple A Digital Awards 2021.

Separately, in the magazine’s Triple A Sustainable Capital Markets Regional Awards, Citi was named Best Bank in the Asia-Pacific.

“These awards represent exceptional recognition of our team’s focus on delivering solutions across the Asia-Pacific through a time of challenge. We thank our clients for the trust they place in us every day, and we are excited about continuing to support and grow with them,” said Peter Babej, CEO, Citi Asia-Pacific.

The Digital Awards 2021 logo

In Vietnam, Citi’s mobile-first strategy empowers the customers to do the majority of their banking needs remotely. In Vietnam, the customers all but one have opted for e-Statements, and more than 60 per cent of them are active using Citi Mobile App and Citibank Online.

Despite the ongoing pandemic, Citi’s award-winning online banking platform for corporate and institutional clients – Citi Direct BE – has enabled clients to continue with their core banking activities.

In consumer banking, during the COVID-19 period, Citi partnered with the biggest e-commerce sites in Vietnam to bring more discounts for customers. Citi cardholders could also use their points to pay directly for several transactions. Citi is proud to be the only bank in Vietnam that offered such digital features to cardholders. In April 2021, it is also the first bank in the market to launch some prominent features on mobile application including Citi Pay with Points, Cash Rebate, Booking Installment Plans.

“Our global mission is to ‘Be the Best’ for our clients and this is the cornerstone of our digital product development roadmap for both corporate and individual clients,” said Thuy Lai, Citi Vietnam interim country officer.

A social housing project in Vietnam (Illustrative photo: HUD)

Hanoi (VNA) – Workshops sharing experience in social housing development of the Republic of Korea (RoK) and policy improvements in Vietnam will be held in major cities of HCM City, Da Nang and Hanoi in the coming time, according to the Ministry of Construction (MoC).

The events are part of a project on the building of a master policy on Vietnam’s social housing development for the 2021-30 period, which is carried out using non-refundable official development assistance (ODA) from the RoK government via the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA), said Deputy Director General of the MoC’s Housing and Real Estate Market Management Bureau (HREM) Ha Quang Hung.

The project strives to devise and complete legal documents on the field, particularly in Vietnam’s current policies, survey the need of those who are eligible for social housing, provide training for staff in charge of building social housing policies for 2021-30, and revise the housing law 2014.

KOICA experts will replicate ideas from different pilot programmes and apply successful ideas in Vietnam’s specific conditions. Analysis, evaluation and recommendations will be provided for the MoC to fine tune mechanisms and policies in a bid to integrate advanced social housing development approaches in the world into Vietnam’s social housing programmes.

Statistics of the HREM showed that 249 social housing projects for low-income earners in urban areas and workers at industrial parks have been finished so far, with more than 104,200 apartments spanning about 5.4 million sq.m.

Meanwhile, 264 projects housing some 219,000 apartments are underway. However, the result is still far behind the target set by the national housing development strategy of 12.5 million sq.m of social housing by 2020./.

Participants at the seminar (Photo: VNA)

Hanoi (VNA) – Many businesses from the Republic of Korea (RoK) are looking to connect and get more information about the Vietnamese market as well as investment policies of the country, especially in auto parts, mechanics, and electronics, said Vu Ba Phu, Director of the Vietnam Trade Promotion Agency (Vietrade) under the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT).

Speaking at seminar jointly held by Vietrade, the Korea Trade Investment Promotion Agency (KOTRA) and the Vietnam National Trade Fair and Advertising Company (Vinexad) in Hanoi on April 15 in the framework of the 30th International Trade Fair (Vietnam Expo 2021), Phu said this was a good opportunity for Vietnamese industrial parks and businesses to connect with Korean firms to attract investment and expand cooperation in developing value chains in manufacturing.

Auto parts manufacturing is one of the top areas attracting interest from businesses in Vietnam at present, Phu said.

Participant focused their discussions on policies for developing the automobile manufacturing and assembling industry in Vietnam, as well as how to form a sustainable manufacturing link chain in the auto parts sector.

Pham Tuan Anh, Deputy Director of the MoIT’s Industry Agency, said that a number of domestic firms have actively participated in the global automobile manufacturing chain.

Accordingly, the country’s total designed assembling capacity is about 755,000 vehicles per year, of which foreign-invested firms account for about 35 percent. Domestic manufacturing and assembling of many large firms have meet about 70 percent of the domestic automobile demand with the total output of passenger cars hitting 200,000 units per year.

However, Anh noted that the automobile manufacturing industry has not yet formed a system of large-scale suppliers of materials and components, which makes car prices in Vietnam still remain high compared to other countries in the region.

In order to further promote the domestic automobile manufacturing and assembling industry and help the auto parts manufacturing industry participate deeply in the global value chain, experts said attention should be paid to developing healthily the automobile market by creating a market large enough for domestic automobile manufacturers, and encouraging the use of locally-manufactured cars.

Vietnamese automobile manufactures should be supported more to improve their manufacturing ability and competitiveness, they added./.