In the January edition of its monthly Vietnam Macro Monitoring, the bank said the country’s industrial production and retail sales continued to expand solidly, with growth rates close to pre-pandemic levels.

December 2020 marked another strong performance of merchandise trade, with double digit growth rate in imports (23.1 percent) and exports (17.8 percent), while FDI inflows slowed.

Consumer price index remained flat in December 2020, as food prices stabilised, while consumer demand has yet to fully recover from the crisis.

Credit growth picked up slightly after the State Bank of Vietnam cut policy interest rates in October, ending 2020 at 10.1 percent.

The approval and rollout of several COVID-19 vaccines at the end of 2020 raised the outlook of domestic and global economies in 2021, particularly for tourism and airlines.

The government will need to assess carefully when to unwind macroeconomic policies launched in response to the crisis to minimise negative impact on the economy, the bank suggested./.VNA