Enterprises decide on legal raw material sources
The end of the monopoly on gold bar production opens a new chapter for the market, but the accompanying "playing rules" are also completely new.
According to the document explaining the opinion of the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV), this agency will not "hand the hand in directing the work", but requires enterprises and commercial banks (CBSP) to be autonomous and take full responsibility in production activities.
In response to MB and BIDV's proposal to allow the use of raw gold from domestic sources to produce gold bars, the SBV has given the answer "No receipt". The reason is that Decree 232 does not stipulate that the SBV grants a license for this activity.
More importantly, the SBV affirmed: "The source of legal raw materials is decided by businesses and commercial banks themselves". This regulation puts all the burden of proving the legality of domestic gold mining and refining on the shoulders of production units.
take full responsibility when hiring workers
Many units such as VCB, TCB and PNJ have proposed that there should be a legal framework for NHTM to hire another unit to process gold bars. Regarding this issue, the SBV said that domestic and foreign processing activities are carried out in accordance with current laws such as the Trade Law and the Foreign Trade Management Law.
The management agency emphasized that enterprises and commercial banks " take full responsibility for gold bars produced and hired for processing". This means that the brand whose name is on the product will be the unit responsible for the final quality, whether the product is produced at its workshop or at a processing partner.
There are no general standards on the quality of gold bars
Notably, PNJ's proposal to provide detailed instructions on gold bar standards (sizes, volumes, contents, production technology, branding...) was also rejected by the SBV.
The State Bank explained that Decree 232 clearly stipulates that enterprises and commercial banks allowed to produce are responsible for "declaring applicable standards" and "responsible before the law for the standards of volume and content of products produced in accordance with the announced standards...".
Therefore, the draft Circular does not need further guidance. This opens up the possibility that the market will have many types of gold bars with different standards, developed and published by each manufacturer.
