Economic & Financial Highlights of the Week (17/11/2025-23/11/2025)

The economic–financial landscape over the past week saw notable fluctuations as central banks adjusted monetary policies, global trade data continued to soften, and investment flows shifted strongly across markets. Domestic markets were affected by these global movements, with exchange rates, interest rates, and commodity prices exerting pressure on businesses, while regulators intensified measures to stabilize liquidity and support growth.

Global Economy: Internal divisions within the U.S. Federal Reserve have deepened, with one group of officials favoring interest rate cuts to support a labor market showing signs of weakening and another group preferring to pause the rate-cutting path to ease inflationary pressures. According to CME Group’s FedWatch tool, traders estimate that the probability of the Fed cutting interest rates at the December 2025 meeting is around 67%. The September employment report released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics showed a better-than-expected labor market, with 119,000 new non-farm payroll jobs created in September 2025. This marks the first month of solid job creation after four consecutive months of low numbers. Inflationary pressure remains high and far from the Fed’s long-term 2% target. Headline and core inflation in the U.S. are hovering around 3%, a level considered high compared to the long-term target. This has raised concerns among some Fed officials about the risk that cutting rates too early may cause inflation to rebound.

Vietnam Economy: As of November 20, 25 domestic commercial banks had released their average lending rates and average lending/deposit spreads for October 2025. Among the 25 banks, 12 recorded an increase in average lending rates compared to the previous month, including: GPBank (+0.36%/year), BaoViet Bank (+0.33%/year), LPBank (+0.31%/year), PVCombank (+0.30%/year), VIB (+0.27%/year), ACB (+0.22%/year), Sacombank (+0.10%/year), Agribank (+0.08%/year), OCB (+0.04%/year), BVBank and KienlongBank (+0.03%/year), and MB (+0.02%/year).

Stock Market: The VN-Index closed the week at 1,654.9 points, up 1.19% from the previous week, indicating that the market remained stable during the derivatives expiration week. However, liquidity stayed low, averaging VND 21,675 billion — the lowest level since May — mainly due to cautious investor sentiment amid an unclear market trend. Notably, large-cap stocks, especially Vingroup and several banks, recovered well and acted as the main drivers supporting the overall index. Meanwhile, mid-cap and small-cap stocks continued to face correction pressure, reflecting strong capital flow divergence. In addition to internal factors, natural disasters in Central Vietnam also negatively affected expectations for Q4/2025 growth, preventing a meaningful improvement in market sentiment. During the same week, U.S. and Asian stock markets saw sharp corrections due to concerns over an AI bubble, high valuations in the tech sector, and expectations of a Fed rate cut in December. However, given the low correlation between the Vietnamese market and these international markets, spillover effects are expected to remain limited. A positive point during the week is that the VN-Index maintained key support levels, while foreign selling pressure gradually eased. We expect the market to continue consolidating within the broad range of 1,600–1,700 points until new growth catalysts emerge.

Bond Market: According to VBMA’s corporate bond market report for the week of November 10–14, the first half of November saw four corporate bond issuance rounds totaling VND 4,128 billion. Accumulated from the beginning of 2025 until now, the total value of corporate bond issuance has reached VND 495,662 billion. Of this, 28 public issuances accounted for VND 50,583 billion (10.2%), while 400 private placements accounted for VND 445,078 billion (89.8%). Early bond repurchases in November reached only VND 2,807 billion. The slowdown in early redemptions over the past month is primarily due to the significant decline in the value of bonds approaching maturity. Accumulated from the beginning of the year, the value of corporate bonds repurchased early has reached VND 260,409 billion, up 56.1% compared to the same period in 2024. Banks remain the leading sector, accounting for 68.3% of the total early redemption value.

Real Estate Market: Real estate inventory has been increasing again due to rising supply, and since much of the new supply consists of high-end products, overall market absorption has shown signs of slowing. The former HCMC area continues to dominate as an investment location due to stable price growth, supported by competition from neighboring provinces such as Binh Duong and Long An. For long-term asset accumulation and portfolio diversification, the segments of villas, townhouses, and infrastructure-development-for-land-transfer projects may be considered, as their price bases have not fluctuated significantly in recent times.

Alternative Investments: Domestic gold prices fell sharply during the past week as global gold prices corrected strongly to around USD 4,064/oz. SJC gold bars were quoted at VND 148.3–149.8 million per tael (buy–sell), down nearly VND 3 million per tael compared with the previous week. The buy–sell spread was around VND 1.5 million per tael, a margin that narrowed over the week. Global gold prices rose sharply early in the week before declining again toward the weekend and are currently testing the USD 4,000/oz support level. Vietnamese gold prices generally follow global trends, though the domestic–international price gap remains large. Global gold continues to be supported by increasing gold reserves among central banks worldwide and ongoing global economic uncertainties. At present, gold accounts for about 10% of global central bank reserves, and this share is expected to rise amid accelerating geopolitical fragmentation.

Source: Techcombank