In Vietnam, savers sitting on 400-tonne gold hoard rejoice at price boom

2026-01-30 - 05:37

From his newly built three-storey home outside Hanoi, Trinh Tat Thang has watched the surging global gold price with mounting dread. The Vietnamese have a long tradition of holding their wealth in gold, and a parallel practice of borrowing the asset from relatives to build homes rather than cash from a bank. But the debt must be repaid in gold. Family members loaned Thang four glittering one-luong bars – a standard Vietnamese unit equivalent to 1.2 troy ounces (37 grams) – to break ground on his...