Commercial banks shouldn’t be allowed to provide loans to securities businesses and invest in stocks, said economists at a seminar on the Bill on Credit Organizations held by the National Assembly Economy Committee on January 15.

They said it is not the bank’s function, and is risky and unsafe for the credit organization system.

The prohibition is to ensure that banks are responsible for depositors, they added.

Investment banks and commercial banks should be fixed clearly since some investment banks have been established from securities firms in Vietnam.

However, commercial banks objected to the prohibition, saying that they should be limited, but not prohibited, in providing loans to stock businesses.

On the same day, at a conference on Vietnamese banks after the global crisis held by the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s branch in Ho Chi Minh City, Dr. Le Dang Doanh said local banks need to enhance their administrative abilities and healthy competitiveness.

Ly Xuan Hai, general director of Asia Commercial Bank, said the bank system has to be “thin” without many levels of management so it can operate quickly and consistently.