VINACHEM

Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has allowed the State Bank of Vietnam
(SBV) to trade gold bars in an effort to stabilise the local gold market
and stock gold bullion for the State foreign exchange reserve.

the dollar fell for a second day
against most of its major counterparts before a private jobs
report in the U.S. forecast to show companies added positions.

The Standard & Poor’s GSCI gauge of
24 commodities fell 0.1 percent to 642.17 at 5:05 p.m. Singapore
time. The UBS Bloomberg CMCI index of 26 raw materials dropped
0.1 percent to 1,534.107.

International and local economists along with Vietnamese business
representatives gathered in HCM City on March 1 for a seminar to discuss
2013’s opportunities and challenges for the national economy.

State budget revenue dropped by 1.9 percent in the first two months of
the year to US$5.52 billion, accounting for 14.1 percent of the year’s
estimated total.