NFSC: Opportunity for Vietnam’s economy to attract foreign investment

In the context of positive movements in Vietnam’s capital market, it is necessary to continue to boost equitisation, divest state capital and list large enterprises on the stock market in order to attract the inflow of foreign indirect investment (FII).

Illustrative image.
Illustrative image.

The above analysis was made by the National Financial Supervisory Commission (NFSC) in its latest report on Vietnam’s economic situation.

Accordingly, the foreign exchange market is still supported by many factors, such as the abundant foreign currency supply. For the first 11 months of 2017, Vietnam had a trade surplus of US$2.8 billion. Foreign direct investment (FDI) projects had disbursed US$16 billion, up 11.9% over the same period last year, while Vietnam's foreign exchange reserves are at an all-time high of US$46 billion, creating a good balance in stabilising the exchange rate.

On the stock market, the benchmark VN-Index surpassed 900 points and was named among the top three fastest growing markets in the world since the start of 2017, with a growth rate of nearly 41%. Vietnam’s stock market capitalisation reached almost 66% of the GDP, as of the end of November, 2017. According to the NFSC, as a result of the positive sentiments from the APEC Summit 2017, the divestment of state capital in large enterprises, along with the listing of large capitalisation stocks, have strongly attracted the inflow of indirect investment from foreign countries and in Vietnam into the stock market.

In addition, the net buying value of foreign investors on the stock market in November was estimated at US$343 million. In the first 11 months of 2017, foreign investors’s net buying value reached US$1.770 billion, a six fold increase over the same period of 2016.

According the report from the NFSC, the ability to attract indirect capital for the capital market has been improved due to expanding the market scale and improving investor confidence in the government reform policies.