FILE PHOTO: A logo of Saigon Joint Stock Commercial Bank is seen in front of an under-construction building in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, November 30, 2023. REUTERS/Francesco Guarascio/File Photo
"Without lending, SCB will collapse," according to the new information provided to Reuters."If the lending continues, the national treasury will gradually dry up."The new information also described the situation as “unprecedented” for the massive volume of the cash injections, the complexity of the operation and the scale of existing and potential damage to Vietnam’s financial system.
Lending has slowed slightly but averaged more than $900 million a month in the past five months, according to that document, a second document with updates from March 15 to March 20, and a third document from November with monthly updates from October 2022 to October 2023. Lan, the tycoon whose October 2022 arrest sparked the bank run, was sentenced to death on Thursday after being found guilty of masterminding the fraud. She had pleaded not guilty to embezzlement and bribery for allegedly siphoning off $12.5 billion in loans from SCB to shell companies while effectively controlling SCB through proxies.
That was up from 478 trillion dong at the end of October, according to the SCB document that was sent to the central bank. That indicates injections of 23 trillion dong a month since November.