HCMC – No commercial banks lent to enterprises to place deposits to join the recent auctions of four land lots in the Thu Thiem New Urban Area in HCMC’s Thu Duc City, said Nguyen Van Du, acting chief inspector of the Banking Supervision Agency under the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV).
The government of HCMC on December 10 last year held the auctions in which the land price of one winning bid for a 10,060-square-meter lot was a staggering VND24.5 trillion (US$1.07 billion), or VND2.45 billion (US$108,000 ) per square meter, sparking a public debate over the real motive of the local winner, Viet Star Real Estate Investment Co Ltd, an affiliate of Tan Hoang Minh Group. A month after the auctions, Tan Hoang Minh announced that Viet Star would pull out of the deal, thus losing its deposit of more than VND588 billion (US$26 million).
At a recent press briefing on the banking system’s performance in 2021 and its plans for this year, Nguyen Van Du said the central bank had told all banks to review and report their lending, if any, to the companies participating in the auctions.
Most of the banks have submitted their reports.
The four entities that won the land auctions were Dream Republic Corporation, Sheen Mega JSC, Binh Minh Investment Development and Trading Co., Ltd and Viet Star Real Estate Investment Co., Ltd.
Banks were asked to provide information about their customers and loan contracts, the purpose of lending and loan amounts. If the loans provided to these customers were used to join the auctions of the four land lots in Thu Thiem, banks were asked to submit all the relevant documents.
