Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - The Vietnamese dongwould be steady next months, buoyed by positive foreign inflow and reasonablegap between interest rates of the dong and the US dollar as well as thestability of the Chinese yuan, experts said.

According to analysts from the Saigon Securities Inc, the dong’s stability willbe supported as outlook of the country’s disbursement of foreign directinvestment (FDI) and foreign indirect investment (FII) capital is optimistic.In the first two months of the year, foreign investors have poured 8.47 billionUSD into Vietnam, 2.5 times higher than the same period of last year, data fromthe Foreign Investment Agency under the Ministry of Planning and Investmentshowed.

Meanwhile, the interest rate’s gap between the dong and the dollar wasmaintained at reasonable levels of 1.5-1.7 percent per year, the analysts said.

The SSI reports also showed the State Bank of Vietnam has net bought the dollarto date this year to build up the country’s foreign reserves. Earlier, SBV datashowed after buying 6 billion USD last year, it continued purchasing another 4billion USD in the first two months of this year thanks to the available USdollar supply in the domestic market.

On March 12, the SBV set the daily reference exchange rate at 22,949 VND perdollar, down 1 VND from the previous day. With the current trading band of +/- 3 percent, the ceiling rate applied to commercial banks during the day is 23,636VND per dollar and the floor rate 22,262 VND.

Commercial banks meanwhile kept their rates steadily on March 12 morning.

Vietcombank and BIDV listed the rate unchanged from March 11 at 23,150 VND perdollar for buying and 23,250 VND for selling.

The rates at Techcombank also stayed unchanged at 23,130 VND for buying and 23,250VND for selling.-VNS/VNA