Vietnam's Gold Price Plunge Draws Buyers as Shops Run Out of Stock

A sharp fall brings queues instead of a rush to sell

Gold prices in Vietnam fell by approximately VND20 million (US$771) per tael over the 48 hours leading into Saturday, January 31, 2026. Silver dropped about VND35 million per kilogram, nearly 30% below its recent highs. Outside major dealers in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, however, the strongest response was a rush to buy.

Domestic gold prices had plunged roughly 10% as global precious metal markets suffered their steepest decline over two days in months. Buyers nevertheless lined up early, treating the fall as an opportunity to accumulate more metal. Demand to purchase overwhelmed selling at several shops, exhausting supplies and leaving customers empty handed.

Phu Quy's branch on Tran Nhan Tong Street in Hanoi ran out of both gold rings and silver bars by 9:30 a.m., barely an hour after opening. Nearby, Bao Tin Minh Chau had issued more than 100 queue numbers by 9:20 a.m. In Ho Chi Minh City, customers began gathering outside Mi Hong's Bui Huu Nghia Street store at 7 a.m.

The scenes capture competing reactions to the same price shock. Some buyers feared that waiting would mean missing a rebound. Others wanted to sell before their savings lost more value. Against that tension, limited shop inventories, purchase restrictions and large gaps between Vietnamese and international prices made the cost of each decision harder to judge.

As of February 4, the buying rush also sat within a wider regional appetite for physical precious metals. Queues had appeared from Singapore to Sydney, while Vietnamese enthusiasm had spread beyond gold and silver into copper, a metal with a very different resale market.

Dealers ration purchases as supplies disappear

Phu Quy stopped accepting customers at its Hanoi branch once its stock of gold rings and silver bars was exhausted. People still waiting in lines stretching down the street were left with apologies rather than purchases.

A store employee asked those customers to return another day.

Please come back tomorrow,

Bao Tin Minh Chau restricted each customer to one tael of plain gold rings. Similar queues formed at Bao Tin Manh Hai and other established dealers across Hanoi. A tael is a unit used to quote and trade gold locally; a mace is a smaller unit.

Mi Hong's store in Ho Chi Minh City faced comparable pressure. A security guard said dozens of customers were waiting when its doors opened. Within three hours, the shop had sold out of plain gold rings and tightened its purchase limit to one mace per person.

Customers at Phu Quy's Ho Chi Minh City location repeatedly asked about silver bars and ingots, but were told that purchases could only be registered on weekdays. Saigon Jewelry Company, one of Vietnam's largest gold dealers, kept its outlets closed on Saturday morning because it could not meet the surge in demand.

Restrictions on purchases, alongside unlimited selling, reflected the shortage of physical stock available to customers. For someone looking at a falling price, the practical problem was therefore finding metal to buy at that price.

Two savers make opposite decisions

Hoang, a 38-year-old freelancer, arrived at a gold shop at 7 a.m. after following the global fall in precious metal prices during the previous trading session. He had bought gold only days earlier at more than VND170 million per tael. Instead of retreating after the decline, he decided to add to his holdings.

Hoang explained that his concern was missing a recovery, and that he was also purchasing for friends.

I'm worried prices could rebound and I won't be able to buy,

So I'm taking the opportunity to add more, and I'm also buying on behalf of a few friends.

Nga, approaching 60, made the opposite choice. She had started accumulating gold after retiring in mid-2025 and had built holdings of several mace. A fall of nearly VND10 million per tael that morning made her uneasy enough to sell.

Nga described the news that prompted her decision while completing the transaction.

This morning my son told me prices had dropped by nearly VND10 million,

I felt uneasy and decided to sell and use the money for something else.

The wider decline was approximately VND20 million per tael over two days; Nga was describing the nearly VND10 million fall she learned about that morning. Her reaction and Hoang's show how the same market movement can encourage one saver to leave and another to commit more money.

How the rally turned into a buying opportunity

Gold and silver had risen rapidly before the January correction. Silver was up approximately 70% since the start of the year, compared with gold's 25% gain. Silver's reported increase was therefore almost three times gold's, helping explain both the excitement surrounding it and the scale of the subsequent shock.

The sequence also connects the rush at shops with decisions made during earlier stages of the rally:

• Mid-2025: Nga began buying gold after retirement and eventually accumulated several mace.
• Earlier in January 2026: Some investors sold gold at around VND103 million per tael, then returned to buy as prices climbed.
• The 48 hours leading into January 31: Domestic gold fell approximately VND20 million per tael, while silver dropped about VND35 million per kilogram from recent highs.
• January 31, 2026: Buyers queued from early morning in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, and several dealers exhausted stock or restricted purchases.

Huynh Trung Khanh, a market expert, described the correction as a normal development after a rapid rally. He noted that large investors and funds often take profits toward the end of January. Taking profits means selling after a rise to turn an increase on paper into money received.

Khanh advised individuals to regard gold as a defensive asset for protecting wealth over time, rather than as a way to speculate on brief price movements.

Why Vietnamese buyers keep returning to gold

The State Bank of Vietnam has previously identified speculation and hoarding as factors behind soaring domestic gold prices. Weakness in alternative places to invest has added to gold's appeal: corporate bonds remain fragile following past defaults, property prices are beyond the reach of many investors, and bank deposit interest rates are at historically low levels.

Nguyen Huu Huan, head of the Financial Market Department at the Banking Faculty of the University of Economics Ho Chi Minh City, noted that many investors who sold earlier in the month at around VND103 million per tael rushed back as prices spiked.

Those decisions can create a feedback loop. Rising prices draw in buyers worried about missing further gains. Their purchases add demand, which can push prices higher and attract still more buyers. The fear of missing out, commonly called FOMO, can also persist during a correction when people believe the discount will disappear quickly.

Vietnamese gold has at times cost more than VND15 million per tael above the international price. That unusually large gap reflects both speculative demand during global uncertainty and thin liquidity in the local market. Liquidity describes how readily something can be bought or sold.

A domestic premium means buyers pay extra beyond the metal's international value. Their eventual return depends on movements in that local premium as well as movements in world gold prices. Limited physical supply therefore matters alongside the global market when Vietnamese households calculate what their holdings are worth.

Queues across Asia reflect worries about savings

Vietnam's rush was part of a broader movement toward physical precious metals, with similar queues in Singapore, Sydney and Thailand. In Singapore, viral videos from BullionStar showed customers waiting before opening hours. In Sydney, buyers described waits exceeding two hours outside ABC Bullion, with customers ranging from retirees to people in their twenties.

Currency depreciation against the US dollar, persistent inflation and geopolitical uncertainty have encouraged this regional demand. Currency depreciation means a local currency buys fewer dollars. Inflation means the same amount of money buys fewer goods and services.

Michael Langford, executive director of corporate consultancy Airguide International in Singapore, linked the queues to households seeking protection against those pressures.

What they are trying to do is to protect themselves against local currency depreciation,

If you don't have much money in life, and all the goods that you buy and sell are ultimately priced in US dollars, and your local currency is going down, that doesn't feel good. You have got inflation working against you, plus you've got currency depreciation. You are getting hit twice.

Some market veterans interpret intense retail buying differently. They regard crowded bullion shops as a contrarian indicator, a signal that popular enthusiasm may coincide with a market approaching a broad peak. Gold's total market capitalization, the estimated value of its stock, had recently surpassed $30 trillion, with prices reaching record highs above $4,300 per ounce before the correction.

Trader Mayne expressed that view on social media, pointing to enthusiasm for physical gold and commentary from Peter Schiff.

Peter Schiff [is] reaching insane levels of insufferability and people are lining up to buy physical gold. I'm thinking the top is close.

Copper attracts buyers priced out of precious metals

Vietnam's enthusiasm for metals has extended into copper, with some investors buying hundreds of kilograms in the hope of gains resembling those in gold and silver. Global copper prices hover around $13 per kilogram, while retail prices for engraved feng shui copper bars in Vietnam run at roughly twice that level.

Hoa, a resident of Ninh Binh province, bought 200 kilograms of copper bars for VND100 million (US$3,850). She loaded the purchase into her pickup truck at a Hanoi shop.

Hoa explained that online discussions had persuaded her to try a cheaper metal, with a possible household use if the investment disappointed.

Seeing online groups discussing stockpiling copper bars instead of gold and silver, which are already too expensive, I decided to give it a try. At worst, I will use it to make ancestor worship items.

Dinh Lam Toi, who owns a crafting workshop in Hanoi, said he sold out of one ton of copper bars within a week of launching the product. The fashion also reached corporate gifts. Property broker Dinh Dac Nguyen ordered 60 kilograms of copper bars for employees as Lunar New Year presents, replacing traditional wine or confectionery.

Those purchases connect investment hopes with decorative and gift uses. Buyers were paying for physical bars sold in a retail market, where finding a later purchaser could be much harder than acquiring the metal.

A copper buyer discovers the cost of reselling

Le Bich Ngoc, an analyst at a commodity exchange, warned that buyers were falling into FOMO traps without understanding the market's fundamentals. She explained that copper differs from the precious metals investors were trying to imitate.

Gold and silver have liquidity comparable to currency and are scarce, whereas copper is a common industrial metal with abundant supply,

Copper oxidizes easily in Vietnam's climate, corroding and tarnishing in a short time, losing a great deal of value.

Huy Hoang, a 40-year-old trader from Hung Yen Province who sought quick gains, experienced the resale problem directly. After paying VND36 million for 100 kilograms of copper billets on the strength of social media enthusiasm, he could not find buyers.

Huy Hoang said he eventually sold the copper back to the original dealer at a loss of VND2 million. He described both the online promotion and his reason for accepting the loss.

There are many sellers but few buyers. The posts online are mostly fake accounts used to lure in inexperienced investors,

Better to lose VND2 million than hold a hundred kilograms of heavy metal that will tarnish over time and sell for scrap at a throwaway price.

His VND2 million loss amounted to about 5.6% of the VND36 million purchase price. The experience illustrates the practical importance of liquidity: an advertised price is useful to an investor only when a buyer is willing to pay it.

Silver combines investment demand with industrial use

Silver's approximately 70% rise before the January correction and subsequent fall of nearly 30% made its swings more dramatic than gold's. The metal attracts investors seeking a financial refuge, while also serving industrial uses in solar panels, electric vehicles and electronics.

Industrial demand gives silver buyers a reason to look beyond investment flows. It also exposes the metal to changes in economic conditions, contributing to greater volatility than gold during uncertainty. Technical analysis, which examines price patterns and market momentum, showed strong momentum alongside vulnerability to sharp corrections.

Financial forecasts made for 2025 suggested a silver price range of $28 to $32 per ounce. Some analysts predicted a rise to $35 if industrial demand and inflationary pressures persisted. Those forecasts preceded the January 2026 buying rush.

The gold-silver ratio measures how many ounces of silver have the same value as one ounce of gold. The ratio was described as suggesting that silver might be undervalued relative to gold, potentially helping explain Vietnamese interest in silver during the price drop. No numerical ratio was given.

Regulators warn about volatility and trading costs

The State Bank of Vietnam continues to warn that gold is volatile and advises people to trade only through licensed dealers, especially during sharp price movements. Deputy Prime Minister Ho Duc Phoc previously directed tighter supervision of gold trading to prevent manipulation and protect retail investors.

Financial advisers recommend keeping precious metals at 15% to 20% of a portfolio's total value to preserve diversification. Diversification means spreading savings across different investments rather than relying heavily on a single asset.

Economist Nguyen Tri Hieu warned that elevated gold prices and limited physical supply created substantial risks, including sharp falls when speculative peaks lose momentum. He urged buyers to consider transaction costs as well as possible price gains.

Investors should be cautious of the buy-sell price difference and carefully assess risks,

Investors need to stay calm, avoid herd mentality, and control FOMO.

The difference between a dealer's buying and selling prices is the spread. Customers pay the higher selling price to acquire gold, then receive the lower buying price when selling it back. That gap can erode profits, particularly for small investors, even before changes in the metal's market price are considered.

January 31's queues brought these pressures together: falling global prices, strong local demand, scarce shop inventories and buyers making sharply different choices about their savings. Gold's role as protection over time remained central to the advice from Khanh and regulators, even as customers sought quick opportunities in gold, silver and copper.

The Bottom Line

• On January 31, 2026, buyers queued at Vietnamese gold shops despite a sharp correction in precious metal prices.
• Domestic gold fell roughly 10%, approximately VND20 million per tael over two days. Silver dropped nearly 30%, about VND35 million per kilogram from recent highs.
• Phu Quy in Hanoi exhausted gold ring and silver bar stocks by 9:30 a.m.; other dealers rationed purchases or ran out of plain gold rings.
• Queues in Singapore, Sydney and Thailand reflected wider demand for physical metals amid inflation, currency depreciation and geopolitical uncertainty.
• Vietnam's domestic gold premium has at times exceeded VND15 million per tael above international prices.
• Copper speculation brought purchases of hundreds of kilograms, alongside warnings about abundant supply, oxidation and difficulty reselling.
• Regulators urge trading through licensed dealers. Financial advisers recommend limiting precious metals to 15% to 20% of a portfolio, while economists warn about spreads and FOMO.