The State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) could sell from US$4-10 billion to commercial banks this year to stabilise the foreign exchange market if necessary, HCM City Securities Corporation (HSC) forecast.

According to HSC’s latest report, after selling $2 billion in recent weeks, the SBV was closely monitoring the market and was ready to intervene again.

HSC analysts believed that the SBV would pursue a flexible policy to stop the rising US dollar/dong exchange rate rather than reducing the rate.

HSC also kept its previous forecast unchanged that the US dollar would strengthen by 3 per cent against the dong this year if the ICE US dollar index fluctuated at around 94-97 points and the US dollar/yuan exchange rate was set at around 6.8-7 points from now to the end of this year.

HSC noted that it would revise the forecast if one of the two above assumptions did not materialise. However, it believed that these assumptions were reasonable as the US president wanted a weak dollar and China was also aware of the consequences if the dollar/yuan exchange rate exceeded the threshold of 7 points.

On Tuesday, the SBV continued to adjust up the daily reference exchange rate from the previous day by VND10 to VND22,669 per dollar.

With the current trading band of +/- 3 per cent, the ceiling rate applied to commercial banks during the day was VND23,348 per dollar and the floor rate VND21,990.

Opening hour rates at commercial banks also rose compared to Monday.

Vietcombank raised both rates by VND20, listing the buying rate at VND23,220 per dollar and the selling rate at VND23,300.

The rates at BIDV went up VND35 to VND23,240 for buying and VND23,320 for selling.

At Techcombank, the greenback was being bought at VND23,220 and sold at VND23,320, both up VND30 from Monday. — VNS