Many banks improve interest margins
The deposit interest rate level is maintained at a high level, causing banks to pay more to attract deposits. However, the business results of Q2/2026 show that the profit margin at many banks has begun to improve compared to the beginning of the year.
According to Vietcap's calculations from the financial statements of 11 banks including: Vietcombank, BIDV, VietinBank, MB, Techcombank, VPBank, ACB, HDBank, VIB, TPBank and LPBank. The results showed that 9 banks had net interest margin (NIM) in the second quarter increasing compared to the first quarter, LPBank was almost flat, while VPBank decreased.
NIM can be simply understood as for every 100 VND of asset generating interest, how many VND of interest income the bank retains after deducting capital costs. Increased NIM shows that the difference between earned interest and capital costs is widened.
Accordingly, MB's NIM increased from about 3.8% in the first quarter to 4.15% in the second quarter. HDBank increased from about 3.79% to 4.11%; Techcombank from 3.41% to 3.7%; ACB from 2.78% to 3.03%. Vietcap said that the improvement at these banks occurred even when capital costs were still under pressure.
This trend also appears in the group of commercial banks with state capital. Vietcombank's NIM in Q2 increased to 2.97%, VietinBank to 2.88% and BIDV's NIM increased by 22 basis points compared to Q1, to 2.12%.
Commenting on the entire industry, in the Banking Industry Update Report for Q2/2026 dated August 14, DSC Securities said that the interest rate environment is still high due to pressure from inflation and liquidity. However, the net profit margin of the industry has recovered compared to the first quarter of the year.
Why are mobilized funds still expensive, but profit margins are still increasing?
A noteworthy point is that the recovery interest rate margin does not mean that banks have mobilized cheaper money. According to DSC Securities, the interest rate environment in Q2/2026 is still high under pressure from inflation and liquidity.
For example, Techcombank, capital expenses in Q2 increased quite strongly compared to the previous quarter. But the profits earned from loans and interest-generating assets increased faster. As a result, NIM still increased from 3.41% to 3.7%. According to Vietcap, this improvement is supported by the bank's adjustment of asset interest rates, credit portfolio optimization and some unfavorable factors in Q1 that are no longer repeated.
BIDV also clearly shows this mechanism. According to SSI Research's BIDV Update Report dated August 24, the bank's NIM increased from 1.91% in the first quarter to about 2.1% in the second quarter. During this time, BIDV's cost of capital increased by 0.54 percentage points, but asset yield increased more sharply, adding 0.71 percentage points.
Part of the reason comes from previous home purchase loans enjoying preferential interest rates of 6-7% starting to switch to floating interest rates of about 9-11%. SSI said that only about one-third of BIDV's home purchase loan portfolio has been converted to a new interest rate level.
Simply put, in some cases, the costs that banks have to pay to mobilize money still increase, but the revenue from money lent increases faster. The gap between the two sides is therefore improved.
However, this trend does not occur in all banks. VPBank is the opposite case when NIM in Q2 decreased from 5.27% to 5.12%. Vietcap said that the reason is that cost of capital increased faster than the improvement in asset yield.
SSI Research also noted that capital pressure on BIDV is still present as deposit interest rate competition between banks is still fierce. Therefore, this unit expects BIDV's NIM to continue to improve but at a moderate level.
From a broader perspective, DSC forecasts that the interest rate level in the second half of the year may decrease slightly or at least remain unchanged thanks to liquidity support policies.
The developments in the second quarter therefore show that the pressure on the profit margin of many banks has somewhat eased after the first quarter of the year. However, the level of recovery is still differentiated and still largely depends on mobilization costs as well as the ability to adjust interest rates on loans in the coming quarters.
