A New Kind of Collateral for Vietnam‘s Small Businesses
For years, Vietnamese tech founders and small manufacturers have faced the same roadblock. They need money to grow, but banks ask for land titles or factory buildings as collateral. Collateral is an asset a borrower pledges to secure a loan. Many startups simply do not own these assets.
A draft amendment now open for public comment could change that. Vietnam’s Ministry of Finance has proposed widening the list of legal collateral to include:
- Digital assets
- Virtual assets
- Intellectual property (IP)
This could let crypto portfolios and tokenized IP back business loans.
According to the original report shared by WuBlockchain via Vietnam News Agency, the proposal sits in a draft revision of the Law on Support for SMEs. SMEs are small and medium-sized enterprises. The draft lists the following as acceptable collateral for bank loans:
- Future-formed assets
- Property rights
- Digital and virtual assets
- Intellectual property
At face value, the draft signals a shift in thinking. Vietnamese regulators appear to see digital assets as real economic resources, not just speculative bets. In their view, small and medium businesses, the backbone of the economy, should be able to use them.
The numbers show why this matters. According to World Bank estimates, Vietnam’s SMEs make up about 98% of businesses and 40% of GDP. Yet fewer than 40% of them can get formal bank credit.
Real estate is still the main form of collateral. That leaves tech firms with few physical assets out in the cold. Stablecoins could be a practical first step. They are less volatile than bitcoin or ether, and many people in Vietnam already use them for remittances and savings.
Tokenization and the Global Collateral Shift
The timing matters. As Vietnam’s finance ministry floats this idea, the global market for tokenized real-world assets has just passed $20 billion on-chain. That figure comes from a blockchainreporter.net tokenization roundup. Tokenization means turning an asset into a digital token on a blockchain.
JPMorgan and Ondo Finance recently completed the first live settlement of tokenized US Treasuries. This shows that big financial players are starting to accept digital assets as collateral-grade instruments.
If Vietnam moves ahead, it could leapfrog richer markets. Small companies could pledge tokenized invoices, IP rights or even stablecoins alongside traditional guarantees. For more on how this market works, see our guide to RWA.xyz, a tracker for tokenized real-world assets.
Still, there is a big gap between proposal and practice:
- Banks would need reliable ways to value assets that can swing 20% in a day.
- A Bitcoin-backed loan with a 150% collateral ratio could face margin calls. A margin call is a demand to add more collateral when its value falls. No local SME is used to managing that.
Regulatory Divergence with the West
Vietnam’s approach is in stark contrast to the stance of US banking interests. In the US, industry groups have been fighting to block crypto legislation just days before a key Senate vote.
Banks attempted to kill the biggest US crypto bill in history by demanding last-minute changes to a deal they had already accepted.
While Washington stays locked in a regulatory battle, Hanoi is quietly testing whether digital collateral can close a real financing gap for its private sector. Vietnam’s drafting process shows a willingness to experiment. That willingness seems missing in many Western capitals. There, fear of enabling money laundering often outweighs the practical need for business funding.
The Developer and Adoption Factor
Vietnam regularly ranks near the top of Chainalysis’s Global Crypto Adoption Index. Heavy peer-to-peer (P2P) trading and DeFi use push it up the list.
Its developer community also punches above its weight. Vietnamese developers contribute to core infrastructure on chains like Ethereum and BNB Chain. In any given week, teams with Vietnamese roots log strong development activity, as recent blockchainreporter.net developer activity data suggests.
This talent base and user familiarity make crypto-backed lending more realistic in Vietnam than in markets where tech skills lag.
What the Draft Doesn’t Answer
The draft law is still at the public comment stage, and many details are missing:
- It does not clearly define “digital assets” or “virtual assets.”
- It does not explain how ownership will be checked for collateral.
- Vietnamese law currently bans using cryptocurrencies for payments.
- The State Bank of Vietnam has not issued clear guidance on crypto custody or lending.
Banks may hold back unless the finance ministry also delivers a matching framework for classifying crypto and managing its risks.
Even if the law passes, lenders will face practical questions right away:
- Which blockchains will be accepted?
- How will forks or airdrops affect collateral value? A fork splits a blockchain in two, and an airdrop gives holders free tokens.
- What happens to tokenized IP when a startup fails?
These problems are not unique to Vietnam. But they remain unsolved in every country that has edged toward crypto-backed lending.
Still, the fact that a finance ministry in Southeast Asia is formally proposing that virtual assets can back bank loans changes the conversation. Public consultation is now open, and the feedback will decide whether the provision makes it into the final law. For Vietnam’s SMEs, the difference between a draft and a binding rule is the difference between a balance-sheet problem and access to working capital. The crypto industry will be watching.
