As of September 20, registered FDI totalled 18.7 billion USD, down 15.3% year on year, according to the Foreign Investment Agency under the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI).
The figure includes 7.12 billion USD poured into 1,355 new projects, respectively falling 43% and rising 11.8%. More than 8.3 billion USD was poured into 769 existing projects, up 29.9% and 13.4%, respectively. Meanwhile, foreign investors spent over 3.28 billion USD on purchasing shares in Vietnamese companies, up 1.9%.
The processing and manufacturing sector continued to take the lead with over 12.1 billion USD in FDI, accounting for 64.6% of total registered capital. It was followed by real estate with over 3.5 billion USD, or nearly 19%.
The MPI said though newly registered investment has yet to fully recover from the COVID-19 pandemic’s impacts and recent global uncertainties, the capital added to existing projects and spent on share purchases have been on the rise.
In the first nine months, Vietnam recorded investment from 97 countries and territories. Singapore was the largest source of FDI during the period with more than 4.75 billion USD (equivalent to 25.3% of the total but still down 24.3% from a year earlier). The Republic of Korea ranked second (3.8 billion USD, equivalent to 20.3%, down 2.38%) and Japan third (1.9 billion USD, equivalent to 10.2%).
Ho Chi Minh City was the biggest FDI destination with over 2.96 billion USD registered, making up 15.8% of the total and rising 26.2%. It was followed by southern Binh Duong province (2.7 billion USD, equivalent to 14.4%, up 58%) and northern Bac Ninh province (1.78 billion USD, equivalent to 9.5%, and increasing 2.1-fold).
As of September 20, Vietnam was home to 35,725 valid FDI projects worth more than 431.5 billion USD.
