On January 16, SMBC announced that it has made its decision to terminate its capital alliance with Eximbank and started the divestment process.

SMBC and Eximbank terminated their strategic alliance on March 18. Since then, SMBC has been engaging in ongoing deliberations regarding the future status of its ownership stake in Eximbank.

As a result of this, SMBC came to the conclusion that it will liquidate its entire equity ownership in Eximbank. SMBC has so far decreased its equity ownership to less than 5 per cent.

Specifically, SMBC has sold 10.8 per cent of Eximbank's equity to domestic investors, reducing its ownership rate to 4.27 per cent. The Japanese lender had agreed to sell 132.8 million of Eximbank's EIB shares on January 13. Following the transaction, this foreign fund is no longer a major shareholder at the Vietnamese bank.

Meanwhile, SMBC will continue efforts to further enhance its Vietnam growth strategy, not only through SMBC Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City branches but also through collaborations with Vietnam Prosperity Joint Stock Commercial Bank – a bank with which SMBC entered into a Business Partnership Agreement in May – and its subsidiary VPBank SMBC Finance Co., Ltd. – a finance company in which SMBC Consumer Finance Co., Ltd. acquired an equity stake in FY2021.