The 2020 figure was higher than that of a year earlier
Remittances to Ho Chi Minh City surpassed forecasts last year, reaching US$6.1 billion, according to the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV).
That statistic was 12 percent higher than a year earlier, said Nguyen Hoang Minh, deputy director of the Ho Chi Minh City branch of the SBV.
It went beyond the previously forecast $5.5 billion figure.
Remittances accelerated near the Lunar New Year festival, which commences on Friday, when overseas Vietnamese kept sending them in droves to their relatives in Vietnam because they could not return to their home country due to COVID-19 travel restrictions.
Foreign currencies were primarily wired from the U.S., Canada, Australia, Japan, Taiwan, Malaysia, South Korea, and others, said Vu Thanh Trung, deputy chief executive officer of Dong An Money Transfer.
Vietnam was projected to receive $15.7 billion in remittances in 2020, ranking 10th on a list of the world’s top recipient countries, the World Bank (WB) said in a report.
The WB forecast global remittances to fall seven percent last year.
