Morning news 7-26: Rental prices in downtown Ho Chi Minh City continue to increase

TP.HCM - Ảnh 1. — Billboards advertising houses for rent or sale are posted on the walls of houses on Dong Khoi Street, Ho Chi Minh City, but prices have increased in shopping malls - Photo: TTD

Rental prices in central Ho Chi Minh City continue to increase

In a recently released report, JLL Vietnam said that asking rents at key shopping malls in the central area continued to grow steadily, benefiting from limited new supply.

Specifically, in the second quarter of 2025, the average gross asking rent on the ground floor in the central area reached 244.6 USD/ ^m2 /month (equivalent to 6.4 million VND), up 1.3% over the previous quarter and up 4% over the same period last year.

Meanwhile, the non-central area recorded a slight increase in average rental price to 65.1 USD/ ^m2 /month (about 1.7 million VND), equivalent to an increase of 1.1% quarterly and 0.7% annually.

Despite facing economic uncertainties, the market still maintains growth momentum thanks to flexible tenant restructuring strategies by investors and the implementation of innovative business models by retailers, JLL experts said.

Regulations on the operation of the Steering Committee for salary reform, social insurance, and incentives for people with meritorious services

Deputy Prime Minister Ho Duc Phoc - Head of the Central Steering Committee on reforming wage policies, social insurance and incentives for people with meritorious services - signed Decision 109 promulgating the operating regulations of this Steering Committee.

The Central Steering Committee is responsible for researching, developing and urging the implementation of the tasks stated in Resolution 27-NQ/TW dated May 21, 2018 of the 7th Conference of the 12th Central Executive Committee on reforming salary policies for cadres, civil servants, public employees, armed forces and employees in enterprises;

Resolution No. 28-NQ/TW dated May 21, 2018 of the 7th Conference of the 12th Central Executive Committee on reforming social insurance policies; resolutions and action programs of the Government to implement Resolution No. 27-NQ/TW and Resolution No. 28-NQ/TW.

The Central Steering Committee also has the task of coordinating with ministries and agencies to research socio-economic policies related to wage policies, social insurance and incentives for meritorious people as assigned by the Prime Minister, helping the Prime Minister monitor and urge ministries, branches and localities in implementing wage policies, social insurance and incentives for meritorious people;

Solutions to create resources for reforming wage policies and social insurance policies; proposing measures to promptly handle new issues arising in the implementation of wage policies, social insurance and incentives for people with meritorious services.

Ho Chi Minh City requires inspection and reinforcement of billboards during storm season

TP.HCM - Ảnh 2. — The welcome gate at Tan Binh market area (Tan Hoa ward, Ho Chi Minh City) suddenly collapsed at around 11:20 on July 20 during a big storm - Photo: PN

Faced with the risk of insecurity from outdoor advertising poles and billboards during the stormy season, the Department of Culture and Sports of Ho Chi Minh City has just issued a document requesting 168 wards, communes and advertising businesses to urgently review and reinforce the system of signs, billboards and advertising poles.

According to the directive, the People's Committees of localities must inspect, handle and dismantle illegal advertising works, those that do not comply with regulations or do not ensure load-bearing structures. Localities must also be responsible for any incidents of collapse of billboards and pillars that are implemented or jointly implemented by the locality.

For advertising businesses, the department requires inspection of the safety level of the construction, proactive repair, replacement or demolition if it does not meet technical requirements. In particular, it must absolutely ensure electrical safety, fire prevention and fighting and be legally responsible if an incident occurs during the peak of thunderstorms and gusts from now until November.

Businesses buy back bonds at record high

According to statistics from S&I Ratings, early corporate bond repurchases took place strongly in the second quarter with a value of more than VND96,000 billion - the highest quarterly level ever.

Accumulated in the first 6 months of the year, the total value of repurchases is estimated at 123,000 billion VND (up 59% over the same period last year).

See the latest news on gold prices today here

According to S&I Ratings experts, this development reflects the debt restructuring efforts of issuers in general when the market has somewhat recovered and interest rates remain at quite attractive levels in the first half of 2025.

In the context of more favorable credit conditions (credit increased by 9.9% in the first 6 months of 2025) and the average lending interest rate decreased by 60 points compared to the end of 2024, businesses tend to prioritize bank loans instead of issuing bonds, in order to optimize capital costs and simplify procedures.

This also helps explain the increasing trend of early buybacks to reduce corporate bond debt pressure.

Epilepsy treatment with positioning robot

For the first time in Vietnam, a case of resistant epilepsy in a child was successfully treated with AutoGuide positioning robot technology. The patient was 9 years old and had seizures since 2021. Initially, the patient responded well to the medication, but by 2024, despite increasing the dose of medication and combining many types, the child still had seizures, sometimes multiple times a day.

Prolonged seizures put children at risk of falling, injury, and affect physical and mental development. According to the World Health Organization, about 30% of epileptic patients do not respond to medication (resistant epilepsy), in these cases surgery to remove the epileptic focus is the most effective.

At Vinmec Central Park Hospital, doctors placed intracranial electrodes under the robot's positioning, so that the robot acted as a guide, helping doctors locate and insert electrodes into the brain, detecting the epileptic focus located in the right frontal orbit and inferior frontal lobe, where many nerves are concentrated. Thereby, the surgery is safe, blood loss is limited, intervention time is short and there are no sequelae.