finance & business news 10 October 2017...10 October 2017 Intellasia No. 21, lane 173/63/17, Ngoc Ha...

10 October 2017

finance & business news

FINANCE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1Reference exchange rate revised down further 1Mixed signals seen in interest rate market 2NFSC: supportive factors still available for lowering interest

rates in Q4 3Banks urged to serve low earners 4Proportion of loans to real estate business and construction

decreases slightly in first 9 months 4Saigon rakes in $3.3 billion in overseas remittances from Jan-Sep 5Consumer finance lures foreigners 5Less cash to be used in payment by 2020 6VN banks rush to cash in on digital wallet 7Objects allowed to import goods for printing and minting

money officially expanded 9Jury still out on cryptocurrency in Vietnam 9Shinhan Bank launches Global Trading centre in Vietnam 11LienVietPostBank plans to sell 25pct stake to foreign

strategic investor 11VIB to buy up to 57 million treasury shares and cancel the

bonus share distribution plan 122017 GDP growth target of 6.7pct in sight: NFSC 12VN shifts away from agriculture 139-months budget deficit falls sharply 14Export value likely to hit 203 billion USD this year 15Vegetable, fruit export import turnover strongly increases 15Rice exporters should diversify markets 16Kien Giang boosts exports in remaining months 16VITAS recommends removing tariffs on polyester fibre 17Efforts to stabilise market in year's end 17Government support policies boost business growth 17More efforts needed to reach the skill gap in Vietnam 18Global franchisers, retailers eye VN 19Bumpy time for automobile market, smooth sale for used cars 20High growth expected for Vietnam's land lot segment 20Vietnamese tourists embrace air charter trend 21Vietnamese farm produce seeks path to Middle East 22Polish businesses seek trade opportunities in Vietnam 23

BIZ NEWS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24Business Briefs 10 October, 2017 24

Financial stocks lift the market 25VN Index seen reaching 810 points this week 25Stock picture looking up on third quarter's earnings 26Surpassing 120 billion USD, Vietnam's stock market

capitalisation is equivalent to 60pct of GDP 27Net foreign capital in securities market rises 80pct y-o-y 27Is there a new Korean investment wave in the stock market? 28Kido Frozen Foods to pay 14pct dividend 29Telecom operator VNPT schedules IPO in 2019 29Vietnamese consumers second-most optimistic in Asia-Pacific 30Vietnamese women contribute significantly to economy 30Aviation authority to probe passenger data leaks 32Vietnam collects nearly 1.1 trillion VND in forest environment

fees 32HCM City to ban pork without clear origin at wholesale markets 33More milk tea shops open in Vietnam 33Emigration of highly-skilled individuals quite high 34Quang Nam ensures food safety, hygiene for Apec 34Open policies for Van Don special economic zone 35Vietnam's German-made smart cities 36EuroCham opens Hai Phong chapter 37Vietnam & Netherlands establish Fresh Academy 37Vietnam Railways in grave need of restructuring 38RoK liquor maker opens Korean-style soju bar in Vietnam 39UPS bolsters export & import services in central and

southern region 39Idemitsu Q8 officially joins Vietnamese petroleum retail sector 40Vietnamese vexed by Viettel's plan to charge iMessage

activation fees 41EVN reports fewer power cuts in 2017 42Vinasun taxis sloganise against Uber and Grab 42VNA to move operations to T4 at Changi Airport 43Vietjet's hot air balloon lands in America 43What lies behind Vietlott CEO's resignation 44Experience new technologies in the water industry at

VIETWATER from 8 to 10 November 2017 44Vietnam Business Week to take place in early November 45Canon Expo to open in HCM City 45

FINANCE

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FINANCEReference exchange rate revised down further

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| VNA

The State Bank of Vietnam revised the daily reference exchange rate for VND/USD down by another 2 VND to 22,467 VND on October 10.With the current trading band of +/-3 percent, the ceiling rate applied to commercial banks during the day is 23,141 VND and the floor rate 21,793 VND per USD.The opening hour rates at major commercial banks showed little changes from October 9.Vietcombank kept both rates unchanged from the previous day, at 22,690 VND (buying) and 22,760 VND (selling) per USD.Vietinbank cut both rates by 5 VND to 22,690 VND (buying) and 22,760 (selling) per USD.Meanwhile, BIDV is buying the greenback at 22,690 VND, the same as on October 9, and selling at 22,775 VND, up 15 VND

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Vietnam finance & business 10 October 2017

Mixed signals seen in interest rate market

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| DOANH NHAN SAI GON

The recently announced deposit rates by Vietnam International Commercial Joint Stock Bank (VIB) have increased 0.2 percent for terms of less than 12 months i.e. from 4.8 percent to five percent for 1-5 month terms; 5.2 percent to 5.4 percent in 6-month term; 5.3 percent to 5.5 percent for 7-8 month terms; and 5.4-5.6 percent for 9-11 month terms.Conversely, deposit rates decreased 0.2 percent for 18-month, 24-month and 36-month terms, showing increased demand for short-term capital and decreased demand for medium and long-term capital after the bank had successfully issued a large volume of 18-month and 24-month deposit certificates earlier this year.Earlier, at the end of August, VPBank increased deposit rates by 0.2 percent for 1-2 month terms and 0.1 percent for 3-6 month terms. This is a remarkable move as over the past months, this bank has continuously reduced deposit rates thanks to abundant source of capital after having strengthened the issuance of deposit certificates with an increased value of 8.255 trillion dong in Q1 alone.At the same time, DongA Bank also increased its interest rates i.e. 0.6 percent for 1-month term, 0.5 percent for 2-month term, 0.3 percent for 3-4 months, 0.2 percent for 5-6 month terms, and 0.1 percent for 7-month term. Currently, DongA Bank's interest rates for less than six month terms have reached the ceiling of 5.5%. Along with that, many other banks such as Bao Viet Bank raised interest rates by 0.1-0.15 percent for 7-11 month terms; 0.1-0.4 percent for 2-month, 5-month, 9-month, 11-month, 18-month and 24 month terms and 0.3 percent for 6-month term.On the contrary, some banks have recently reduced interest rates. For example, on Sep-tember 9, Techcombank reduced 0.1 percent for less than 12-month terms; 0.2 percent in 12-month and 13-month terms but increased 0.1 percent for 24-month and 36-month terms. Since February, Techcombank has always raised interest rates, therefore, the re-cent interest rate reduction is quite remarkable.Similarly, since September 11, the Orient Commercial Joint Stock Bank (OCB) started to reduce deposit rates in terms i.e. 0.15-0.2 percent for 1-5 month terms; 0.05-0.2 per-cent for 7-11 month terms; 0.1-0.15 percent for 15-month, 18-month, 24-month and 36-month terms. Another bank i.e. GPBank also lowered 0.1 percent interest rates for terms from 6-months and above since September 18.Meanwhile, interest rates in the interbank market is showing signs of inching up. If in August, the overnight interest rate only ranged around 0.5%, then since the beginning of September, it has increased again along with other terms.As per the update of the State Bank, as of September 20, overnight interest rate was 0.87%, up 26 basis points compared to the beginning of the month. The interest rate for one-week term was 0.96%, up 26 basis points while 2-week term swelled 22 basis points to 1.05 percent and one-month term hiked 56 basis points to 1.99%.Although the system's liquidity is still plentiful, each bank is different. Especially, with the State Bank's recent adjustment of credit growth after the government asks the banking sector to attain the credit growth of 21%, the demand for capital preparation will improve. Therefore, the possibility of raising deposit rates may continue happen-ing in banks with capital shortage and are adjusted to sharply increase credit indica-tors.Currently, many banks have used up credit targets allocated by the State Bank since the beginning of the year. Therefore, the increase in this target is inevitable. Specifical-ly, the interest rate at Military Bank was adjusted up by 20 percent from the initial level of 16%, and that at VIB was improved from 16 percent to 24%, and that at ACB was raised from 16 percent to 20%.However, that fact that the State Bank may postpone the application of the regulation on the usage of short-term capital for medium and long-term loans at maximum 40 percent till the beginning of 2019 will help reduce the capital mobilisation pressure on banks, especially for medium and long-term capital. Therefore, some banks have re-cently increased interest rates in less than 12-month terms, but reduced in long terms.However, inevitably, liquidity pressure will increase at the end of the year in the face of increased capital demand for business and production at peak season. Therefore, it will also affect interest rates. Apart from the fact that many banks have increased input rates in recent time, the prime minister's requirement to reduce lending rates by 0.5 percent will be difficult to be achieved in Q4 this year if the State Bank does not have solutions to direct the market or further support credit organisations.Or if not, the reduction in lending rates may occur but only in a few large banks with abundant capital and only applies formally for new customers under preferential pro-

Intellasia 10 October 2017 2 / 45

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grammes, promotions and priority sectors under the direction of the State Bank and is difficult to happen synchronously across the sector.

NFSC: supportive factors still available for lowering interest rates in Q4

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| NDH

According to the report of the National Financial Supervisory Commission (NFSC) on the financial market in the first nine months of the year, the liquidity of the banking system in general was relatively good.The average ratio of Lending to Deposits (LDR) of the system reached about 87.2%, higher than the 87 percent recorded in the end of the second quarter and much higher than late 2016 (85.47%) and 2015 (85.6%). The LDR in dong was 88 percent and in for-eign currency was 73%.The average ratio of short-term funds used for medium and long-term loans of credit institutions (CIs) was estimated at about 33.4%, slightly down compared to late 2016 (34.5%). However, this ratio at some CIs, according to the NFSC, has come close to the ceiling limit of 50 percent stipulated in Circular 06 of the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV).So far, SBV has completed taking comments for the second draft Circular amending and supplementing Circular 36/2014/TT-NHNN. One of the important changes is the extension of the roadmap to lower the ratio of using short-term funds for medium and long-term lending.Circular 06/2016 amending Circular 36/2014 specified that this ratio would be cut to 40 percent in early 2018. However, if the second draft circular is approved, from January 1st 2018, this ratio will be reduced from 50 percent to 45 percent for banks and foreign bank branches. The 40 percent limit will be applied from early 2019.Thanks to the fairly good liquidity, dong deposit rates slightly fell. As of September, the average deposit rates fell by 0.03-0.05 percentage point compared to the second quarter of 2017, equivalent to the beginning of the year.Report of the NFSC also stated that lending rates also declined slightly, particularly rates for priority areas. Recently, lending rates to priority areas have fallen by 0.5-1 percent per annum. Good customers may enjoy rates of about 4-5 percent per annum.According to data of SBV, as of late August, the VND deposit rates were popular at 0.8-1 percent per annum for non-term deposits and deposits with terms of less than one month, 4.5-5.4 percent per annum for deposits with terms of one month to less than six months, 5.4-6.5 percent per annum for deposits with terms of six months to less than 12 months, and 6.4-7.2 percent per annum for deposits with terms from 12 months and more.Meanwhile, the lending rates for priority areas were popular at 6-6.5 percent per an-num on short terms, while state-owned banks offer medium and long-term lending rates for priority areas at 9-10 percent per annum. Lending rates to normal production and business areas are ranging at 6.8-9 percent per annum on short terms and 9.3-11 percent per annum on medium and long-term. For good customers with healthy and transparent financial condition, short-term lending rates are 4-5 percent per annum.Maintaining the same assessment made in the previous months, the NFSC believed that there are still factors to support the reduction of lending rates in the last quarter of 2017. Firstly, the pressure from inflation is not significant as the Dollar Index has fallen fairly sharply. Moreover, the inflation is most likely to be under control (at less than 4%); and the remaining target of the government bond in the last months of the year is just less than 20 percent of the annual plan, while the bond yields across the terms are still about 1-1.5 percent percentage points lower than early 2017, facilitating the reduction of interest rates. The last factor is an important one that comes from the mechanism and legal framework on settling bad debts under the Resolution 42 of the National Assembly.

Banks urged to serve low earners


Vietnam has significant room to promote inclusive finance, given 70 percent of its pop-ulation is living in rural areas and many are locked out of the conventional banking system due to low income, experts have said.


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However, there were challenges in making banking products and financial services available to the low-income population, especially those living in remote areas, such as poor infrastructure system and preference for cash.According to Le Phuong Lan, deputy director of the Banking Strategy Institute, inclu-sive finance aimed at ensuring banking products and financial services provided by of-ficial financial institutions were accessible to all segments of the population at reasonable cost, which was critical to reduce poverty and accelerate the country's eco-nomic growth.A number of programes had been implemented to promote inclusive finance, such as projects to develop cashless payment, micro-finance system development, improving access to banking services, and credit support policies for agricultural businesses, small and medium enterprises, students and poor households, Lan said.Vietnam is in urgent need for inclusive finance as the demand for capital was increas-ing and the non-performing loan ratio at micro-financial institutions and social policy banks was much lower than other places, experts said.Facts, however, showed that access to banking and finance services was still limited in rural and remote areas.Statistics by the central bank revealed that the percentage of adults with accounts at official financial institutions increased from 21.3 percent in 2012 to 30.9 percent in 2014, still low in comparison with countries such as China with 78 percent and Thailand with 79 percent.Vo Viet Hung, director of the central bank's Monetary and Financial Stabilisation De-partment, said management agencies should develop inclusive finance in line with fi-nancial stability.This would require the cooperation of relevant organistions and the application of high technologies to ensure convenience and safety of residents and businesses, Hung said.Interest rates were not always at the lowest level, Hung said, adding that international experiences had shown that the rates should be competitive to ensure healthy compe-tition among financial institutions.Phan Cu Nhan of the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies' International Integration De-partment said it was critical to provide training about how to use capital effectively along with promoting inclusive finance in Vietnam.Nhan added that banking products should be diversified to meet the abundant de-mand of low-income earners, together with the application of high technologies, such as mobile banking, to improve access.The State Bank of Vietnam was in charge of developing a national strategy on financial inclusion.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/banks-urged-to-serve-low-earners/119179.vnp

Proportion of loans to real estate business and construction decreases slightly in first 9 months

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| TRI THUC TRE

As per the report about the economic and financial situation in the first nine months of the year and the forecast for the entire year 2017 by the National Financial Supervisory Commission (NFSC), credit of the economy in January-September has attained posi-tive growth.By the end of September 2017, credit was estimated to increase 11.5 percent and 12.9 percent if including corporate bonds compared to the end of 2016 (up 12.5%).Regarding credit structure by terms, the proportion of medium and long-term credit continues to decrease. Medium and long-term credit is estimated to increase 10.7 per-cent (compared to 14.9 percent in the same period of 2016), reckoning for 54 percent of the total credit (compared to 55.6 percent in the same period of 2016).Regarding the credit structure by currency, credit in dong still accounted for large pro-portion. However, credit growth in foreign currency in the first nine months of 2017 was much higher than the same period of 2016.Specifically, foreign currency credit was estimated to increase 12.9%, much higher than the 5.4 percent in the same period of 2016, reckoning for 8.4 percent of the total


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credit. Credit in dong is estimated to swell 13 percent from the end of 2016 (compared to 14.4 percent in the same period of 2016), making up about 91.6 percent (almost un-changed compared to the same period of 2016).Regarding the credit structure by economic industry, loans for hired labour, produc-tion of physical products and self-consumption service of households have continued to increase sharply since 2015, and are estimated to reckon for 15.7 percent of the total loans by the end of September 2017, up from 11.2 percent at the end of 2016.The proportion of loans for industry and construction sectors increased from 22.4 per-cent to 23.4%; the proportion of loans for agriculture, forestry and fishery decreased from 8.3 percent to 7.6%; the wholesale and retail fell from 18.6 percent to 17.7%.The proportion of loans for real estate and construction business slightly decreased from 17.1 percent (in December 2016) to 16.8 percent (in September 2017), of which loans to construction industry accounted for 10.3%, and loans to real estate business reckoned for 6.5%.

Saigon rakes in $3.3 billion in overseas remittances from Jan-Sep

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| VNEXPRESS

Most of the money was sent by Vietnamese people living in Europe and the USForeign remittances flowing into Saigon increased by 6 percent on-year during the first nine months of 2017 to $3.3 billion, according to the central bank.The HCM City branch of the State Bank of Vietnam said remittances to the southern metropolis had continued to hit new highs with most of the money coming from Eu-rope and the USEach month Vietnamese people residing abroad sent home from $375-$400 million, ac-cording to a branch representative.He estimated the city will rake in $5.7 billion in remittances this year."More remittances are being invested in business operations rather than in property or savings as before," he added.Vietnam recorded $13.4 billion in overseas remittances last year, and was ranked ninth by the World Bank among the world's biggest beneficiaries of remittances. It was also third in Asia-Pacific after China and the Philippines.Remittances from overseas Vietnamese remain a key source of funding for the coun-try's economy, equivalent to about 8-10 percent of gross domestic product.But some experts have warned that, with Federal Reserve officials in the US tipped to raise interest rates and the tighter border controls imposed by the Trump administra-tion, overseas Vietnamese in the US may have fewer incentives to send money home. https://e.vnexpress.net/news/business/saigon-rakes-in-3-3 billion-in-overseas-remit-tances-from-jan-sep-3653027.html

Consumer finance lures foreigners

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| VNS

Consumer finance is proving to be an attractive sector with the number of foreign com-panies rising through mergers and acquisitions, the news site cafef.vn reported.In late September, the Vietnam Technological and Commercial Joint Stock Bank (Tech-combank) reportedly sold its stake in the financial arm TechcomFinance to the South Korean credit firm Lotte Card, a member of Lotte Group, for 87.5 billion won or VND1.73 trillion (US$76.9 million).After being purchased by Techcombank in January 2015 from the Vietnam National Chemical Group (Vinachem), TechcomFinance has VND600 billion in charter capital.The deal will allow Lotte Card to issue credit cards, provide installment financing services and consumer finance in Vietnam, and target the local consumer finance sec-tor, valued at VND744 trillion as of June 30, 2017, equal to 12.4 per cent of the Vietnam-ese economy's credit balance.In mid-September, MCredit the financial arm of the Military Commercial Joint Stock Bank (MBBank) officially changed its name to MB Shinsei Consumer Finance Co Ltd, a step that helped MBBank completed selling a 49 per cent stake in MB Shinsei Con-sumer Finance to the Japanese bank Shinsei. The deal between the two banks was signed in November 2016.


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Local consumer finance companies have also made their way to expanding market coverage, such as FE Credit the consumer finance arm of Vietnam Prosperity Joint Stock Commercial Bank (VPBank).FE Credit in July 2017 raised its charter capital to VND4.49 trillion from the previous VND2.79 trillion. It has continuously increased charter capital from VND1 trillion since being acquired by VPBank from the Vietnam National Coal and Mineral Indus-tries Group (Vinacomin) in June 2014.According to FE Credit, the competition in Vietnam's consumer finance industry will get fiercer as more players enter the country, reducing market shares and comparative advantages of those already present in the market.Economic and financial specialist Cn Vn Lc said at an online conference on September 27 that consumer finance would help people afford their needs and manage their fi-nances better.It would further develop the sector of individual consumer spendingwhich accounted 67-68 per cent of Vietnam's gross domestic product (GDP) having a positive impact on the country's socio-economic development and stablising the financial market, he said.According to analysts, the consumer finance business still has room to grow and the participation of both domestic and foreign companies will help boost the sector's influ-ence on the Vietnamese economy.http://vietnamnews.vn/economy/405318/consumer-finance-lures-foreigners.html

Less cash to be used in payment by 2020

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| INFONET

The State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) has issued a plan for the development of bank card payment via card-accepting devices for the period of 2017-2020. This plan aims at im-plementing the scheme on development of non-cash payment in Vietnam for 2016-2020 period under the decision of the prime minister.Accordingly, the State Bank works out the plan on development of bank card payment under the method of presenting physical cards, cards digitalised via card accepting equipment at points of sale including Point of Sale (POS), Mobile Point of Sale (mPOS) and other card accepting devices at POS where cardholders can make payment trans-actions for goods and services.The State Bank will study and apply some measures to achieve the goal of developing card payment via card accepting equipment at POS in order to boost non-cash pay-ment in residential area.Specifically is to gradually increase the number and value of card payment transaction via card accepting equipment at POS. By 2020, the entire market has at least 300,000 POSs installed with over 200 million transactions per year; 100 percent of supermar-kets, shopping centres and modern distribution facilities have card accepting equip-ment and allow customers to pay for purchased goods; 100 percent of the State Treasury at provinces and cities directly under the central government, the State Treas-ury in districts, cities, towns directly under provinces, cities that are directly under the central government have card accepting equipment in service of collection for state budget.The solutions discussed will be to continue developing and completing card accepting infrastructure at POS; apply new and modern card payment technologies having fast, simple, convenient payment speed, including the payment using chip card technology (contact and non-contact), payment by mobile devices using NFC/MST technology, payment via QR Code, etc.; properly arrange and enhance quality and efficiency of shared POS network, mPOS, other card accepting units, and encourage non-bank or-ganisations to promote the investment, management, operation and supply of out-sourced service of infrastructure for card accepting equipment network.Notably is the work of ensuring fast, safe, convenient and reasonable payment; en-hancing security, safety in the card payment activity, payment via card accepting equipment at POS. At the same time, there needs to adopt new security measures, new and advanced security standards such as chip card, 3D Secure, biometric authentica-tion, QR Code, Tokenisation, etc. in line with the payment trend in the world, ensuring


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security and safety in payment.In addition, the State Bank also mentioned the communication, promotion, dissemina-tion of knowledge, and education of financial skills, making clearer changes in aware-ness in payment, payment via POS, mPOS, and other card accepting equipment at POS by appropriate measures and methods.Build and carry out measures on motivation, encouragement combined with other measures for relevant units and individuals to promote the payment via POS, mPOS and other card accepting units at POS.Over the last period, many mobile payment methods have started to be tested and im-plemented in Vietnam. Notably, since the end of September, the mobile payment so-lution Samsung Pay has officially been implemented nationwide. Preliminary statistics show that as of September 28, 2017the end of the trial periodthe instalments of Samsung Pay application reached about 20,000 turns, and the number of transac-tions by Samsung Pay touched about 6,000 turns.

VN banks rush to cash in on digital wallet


On September 13 Samsung launched its mobile payment service, "Samsung Pay", in partnership with the National Payment Corporation of Vietnam (NAPAS). Like Sam-sung, Apple also plans to bring its digital wallet, "Apple Pay", to Vietnam soon.At the Mobile World Congress held in Barcelona, Spain, earlier this year, Vietnam's military-owned telecom group Viettel also introduced many of its telecom-based apps and gadgets for a smart society, including the V-Wallet, which is also expected to come to the country soon.Alipay, a third-party mobile and online payment platform belonging to China's Aliba-ba Group, is also seeking a licence in Vietnam.The presence of Samsung Pay and the imminent entry of many foreign and domestic tech giants into the mobile payments market mean banks are feeling the pressure to enter the market quickly so that they are not left behind.The Dau tu (Investment) newspaper has revealed that the Military Joint Stock Com-mercial Bank (MB) is joining hands with Facebook to develop "Facebook Payment" in the country.On September 20, the Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BIDV) and VNPT Media Corporation signed a deal to provide integrated services between the payment intermediary (VNPT Pay) and BIDV for end-customers.The services that will be deployed include collection services, payment gateway serv-ices and e-wallet services, aiming at improving service quality and expanding non-cash payment facilities for their customers. With BIDV-VNPT Pay, users do not have to worry about costs or service suspension due to late payment.Earlier, VNPT Media, a member of Vietnam Posts and Telecommunications Group (VNPT), launched an electronic payment gateway dubbed "VNPT Pay". The service is designed to expand non-cash payment facilities for VNPT customers.BIDV and five other banks have also tied up with Samsung for its Samsung Pay.Also in September LienVietPostBank signed a memorandum of understanding with two Japanese investors, MKI and Doreming, to carry out automated solutions to hu-man resources management and salary payments for companies via Vi Viet e-wallet that allows customers to pay bills and fees and transfer and receive money quickly.The Bank for Foreign Trade of Vietnam (Vietcombank) has expanded its cooperation with VietUnion to use the latter's Payoo e-wallet services to push up its mobile pay-ment activities.VietUnion offers Payoo e-wallet, an electronic account functioning as a wallet in the Internet to assist its users in buying and selling, as well as making transactions on e-commerce websites and internet communities with payment activities.A spokesperson for a local bank said domestic tech companies are also eager to intro-duce e-payment services.Together with the foreign giants, they are a major threat to local banks who fail to em-brace technology and quickly get into the mobile payment market, he said.


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He said the number of smartphone users has increased rapidly, causing a concomitant increase in the use of e-payment services.There are some 35 million smartphones in Vietnam.According to statistics from the Ministry of Industry and Trade, at least 25 per cent of online buyers shopped using their smartphones in 2015.Tech giants have capitalised on the consumer trend to offer mobile payment services.Because of this, many banks have had to quickly acquire new technology and create new products to keep pace.Le Ngoc Lam, deputy general director of BIDV, said in the era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, tie-ups between banks and tech companies are a sound way to enhance the strengths of both sides.The turnover of non-cash payments have been increasing sharply at local banks.Vietcombank for example saw online payment transactions in the first half of the year rise to 36 million, or 60 per cent of last year's number. Their value is growing annually at 150 per cent.The bank has tied up with several tech giants to offer various kinds of payment serv-ices like Momo, Paywoo and Moca.Seafood shares sinkAccording to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, exports of agricul-tural, forestry and seafood products in the first nine months of this year were worth nearly $27 billion, up 14.1 per cent from the same period last year.Seafood accounted for $5.91 billion following an 18.1 per cent rise.Seafood is one of the agricultural sector's biggest export earners but shares of seafood companies are not doing too well.In fact, despite decent results, only a few like the Ben Tre Seafood Import and Export Joint Stock Company (ABT), Minh Phu Seafood Group (MPC), and Vinh Hoan Seafood Joint Stock Company (VHC) have managed keep their heads above water.Hung Vuong Joint Stock Company (HVG), once a darling of investors with its price climbing to VND50,000, has been on a relentless downward trend and dropped below its face value of VND10,000.Some other seafood shares are not traded much and face a big liquidity problem like the Hung Hau Agricultural Joint Stock Company and the Ngo Quyen Seafood Export and Processing Joint Stock Company.Analysts said one of the main reasons for investors' indifference to seafood shares is that they are risk-prone.Seafood businesses often face difficulties while their markets at home and abroad are volatile.Many of the companies have invested in inefficient non-core activities, which hit their bottom lines.The Nam Viet Joint Stock Company (Navico) used to be the industry leader a decade ago, but is now in the doldrums after sinking nearly VND1 trillion (about $4.3 billion) in fertiliser, insurance and banking businesses.Hung Vuong Joint Stock Company, which used to be "King of pangasius" and the big-gest tra fish exporter in Vietnam, is laden with debts of VND12.35 trillion after unsuc-cessfully getting into other businesses like pig farming, processing plants and cold storage systems.Dau Tu Chung Khoan (Securities Investment) newspaper reported that the company had suffered losses of VND140 billion in the two quarters up to March 31 this year.Analysts from the Sai Gon Securities Company (SSI) told the newspaper that investors are also concerned about seafood export markets.The biggest buyers of Vietnamese seafood are the US and European countries.But the US market is gradually closing because of protectionist policies in the form of both tariff and non-tariff barriers, thus affecting Vietnamese exporters.European countries are still struggling with recession and their seafood imports from many countries including Vietnam are sharply down with few signs of a recovery yet.http://english.vietnamnet.vn/fms/business/187985/vn-banks-rush-to-cash-in-on-digit-


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Objects allowed to import goods for printing and minting money officially expanded

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| TRI THUC TRE

The State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) has officially issued a Circular on amendment of some articles in Circular No.18/2014/TT-NHNN guiding the import of goods under the specialised management of the State Bank.Accordingly, in Clause 2, Article 9 of Circular No.18/2014/TT-NHNN, the State Bank issues one-time letter of crediting to the National Money Printing House for receipt of each imported lot (in the same contract).However, in the near future, to serve the money printing, the State Bank has the policy of expanding objects allowed to import goods to serve the money printing or minting, not the only unit i.e. the National Money Printing House like now.The State Bank has submitted to the government to assign the task of printing money and importing machinery, equipment and supplies (ink, paper money, etc.) serving the money printing and minting money to a qualified banking unit having sufficient legal status and infrastructure.With the permission of the government, the State Bank now amends the Circular, stip-ulating that designated importers are "printing and minting establishments" to ensure the legality for the implementation.

Jury still out on cryptocurrency in Vietnam


The use of cryptocurrency and blockchains in Vietnam is currently limited to just one percent of the total population, though experts anticipate that the number could grow to 30 million users in the next ten years.Nonetheless, the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) has clearly stated that unlike legal ten-ders, cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin are not considered real money and thus not rec-ognised as payment methods in Vietnamese law.Bitcoin was first introduced to Vienam in 2009, and has since experienced double-digit growth each year in terms of users, and an average daily transaction value reaching the thousands of US dollar, according to Bitcoin Vietnam Co Ltd, the self-proclaimed first bitcoin platform in the country, established in 2014.Subsequently, bitcoin's blockchain, its own open, distributed ledger that records trans-actions between two parties using the coin in a verifiable and permanent way, is now also accessible in Vietnam.As of late August this year, prime minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc had ordered relevant agencies to draft a legal framework for cryptocurrency and other digital assets, which could mean that bitcoin and its like will be one day accepted in Vietnam under appro-priate management.Nevertheless, at the moment, the issue has a number of loose ends, as the SBV still finds digital currency hard to control. Since bitcoin is a decentralised digital currency, its payment and control system works without a central administrator, so it poses la-tent administrative risks to the SBV in particular and central banks in general.Back in July, the SBV sent out a document clearly stating its non-involvement in man-aging bitcoin on the Vietnamese financial market, as this particular cryptocurrency is not a payment method according to the central bank.This official document also stressed that since bitcoin and litecoin are not legal tender or legitimate currency, the acts of initial coin offering, generation, and use of such cryptocurrencies as means of payment in place of legal tender are all prohibited with established sanctions.The SBV stated that such prohibition is to keep investors safe against the speculative nature of cryptocurrency, especially when there has been a reported surge in the number of bitcoin mining rigs imported to Vietnam, according to the general Depart-ment of Vietnam Customs (GDVC).In reality, the increase in demand for bitcoin mining rigs has troubled administrative authorities, as the GDVC's list of contraband goods according to Decision 187/2013/ND-CP does not regulate these machines, which are computers designed specifically


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for the decryption of bitcoin and litecoin, through which the process of adding trans-action records to bitcoin's blockchain can be completed, thus generating new coins.The SBV and the GDVC have reason to believe that the hike in demand for mining rigs is due to a misunderstanding among part of investors, as they mistakenly consider the aforementioned draft scheme to be an official recognition of bitcoin in Vietnam.As such, new concerns have arisen for Vietnamese authorities. Since bitcoin and simi-lar cryptocurrencies are not accepted as legal payment in Vietnam, the main purpose of most entities importing these mining rigs is to resell them at a higher price instead of actually generating new coins.This would surely lead to a loss for many speculative investors, especially when the lifespan of these rigs is just around two to three months, with replacements worth more than 3,000 USD.The SBV has repeatedly warned domestic investors of the systemic risks that lie there-in, but seemingly to no avail.Back in 2009, the exchange rate for bitcoin was about 30 US cents per bitcoin, and it is now roughly 4,000 USD per bitcoin, with a record high of 5,000 USD, stated Ha Ton Vinh, Chair and CEO of Stellar Management Corporation during a September confer-ence on digital cash and blockchain in Hanoi.He commented that the sharp hike in the value of bitcoin is due to investors' specula-tion, creating hundreds of millionaires in the span of less than a decade while expand-ing technology and financial application over other economic sectors with about 2 billion USD spent on bitcoin research over the past five years.In Vietnam, cryptocurrency, or digital cash, is available in popular forms such as debit or credit cards, or the recently introduced mobile wallets, and in rarer forms such as bitcoin or litecoin, said Terry O'Hearn, Chief Executive Office at iMozi Canada Inc, at the same conference.According to O'Hearn, digital currency allows direct transactions through an online payment device without the need for an intermediate financial entity, thus cutting down transaction costs and increasing convenience.After reaching up to 4,693 USD per bitcoin on August 29, 2017, the coin's value has been gradually decreasing after China slapped restrictions on initial coin offerings, though there is no sign of speculation letting up.Commercial bitcoin sites record a total capitalised value of the cryptocurrency's mar-ket of up to 120 billion USD, allowing a staggering return on investment (ROI) ratio. Any bitcoin investors with enough sway and funding can enjoy an ROI of 150 percent in a month, as oppose to the stock market's 11 percent monthly.As high returns come with equally high risks, the positive nature of the bitcoin market has soon been replaced with grim warnings from experts on the overblown value of the coin due to too much speculation, which can crash at any moment, leading to un-imaginable devastation on financial markets.Jean Y. Foo, Founder and CEO of Singaporean Mastermind Crate, pointed out at the said September conference that the difference between legal tenders such as the US dollar or Japanese yen and cryptocurrency is that while the former must be regulated by a third party during transactions, such as a Central Bank, the latter simply forgoes this step and relies on technological advances for security.Therefore, there is no actual guarantee or failsafe mechanism against the coin's bubble bursting, should it actually happen. And with the many risks that bitcoin investors and users must face online such as cyber attacks, theft, or blocked transactions, the SBV cannot guarantee their safety and financial security.Still, as Vinh suggested, while several countries such as Japan now accept bitcoin as a legal payment method, it is nonetheless unregulated in the majority of economies in-cluding Vietnam and is even heavily restricted in China. Thus, its definitive status as part of the economy is yet to be decided.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/jury-still-out-on-cryptocurrency-in-vietnam/119176.vnp


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Shinhan Bank launches Global Trading centre in Vietnam

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| VN ECONOMIC TIMES

Opening of bank's second such centre, specialising in foreign exchange services, an-nounced on October 9.Shinhan Bank Vietnam announced on October 9 that it has officially launched its Glo-bal Trading centre in Vietnam.This is the second global trading centre put into operation by the bank, joining the first in India.Playing an essential role in its global financial market chain, the focus of Shinhan Bank's Global Trading Centers is on products and services associated with foreign ex-change. The Vietnam centre will be operated by two leading foreign exchange experts from South Korea and supported by a highly experienced Vietnamese foreign ex-change team."With our advances in term of network and personnel and our thorough understand-ing of local markets and clients, our Global Trading centre in Vietnam will be a reliable option for both South Korean and Vietnamese clients for their transactions and invest-ment in global financial markets," said Shin Dong Min, CEO of Shinhan Bank Viet-nam.The centre will provide such services as foreign exchange consultancy and transac-tions, foreign exchange market reports and forecasts, conduct derivative transaction in order to provide currency hedging solutions against foreign rate risks, investment support solutions, and foreign currency trading, among others.With a network of over 1,000 representative offices located in over 20 countries world-wide, The Global Trading centre is expanding the most in South Korea's banking sec-tor.In Vietnam, Shinhan Bank also owns the leading network among foreign-invested banks, with a total of 18 branches and transaction offices nationwide. The strong net-work makes the Global Trading centre a reliable and significant partner of clients and offers them investment opportunities.http://vneconomictimes.com/article/banking-finance/shinhan-bank-launches-global-trading-centre-in-vietnam

LienVietPostBank plans to sell 25pct stake to foreign strategic investor


Bank seeks expertise to expand it foothold.LienVietPostBank is currently in talks to sell a 25 per cent stake to an overseas strategic investor as it seeks expertise to expand its foothold, CEO Pham Doan Son told an Oc-tober 2 meeting with investors.He did not, however, name the foreign partner or the price the shares may be sold for. His statement comes after the bank announced it has decided to on a foreign owner-ship limit of 5 per cent. As at July 17, the bank's largest shareholder was the Vietnam Post Corporation, with 12.54 per cent.Its co-founder, the Him Lam Corp., has not been a shareholder since June, shortly be-fore Him Lam's Chair Duong Cong Minh stepped down as Chair of the bank and was elected Chair the HCM City-headquartered Sacombank.LienVietPostBank expects its foreign partner to support it in building a governance and organisational strategy as well as provide financing, Son said.Foreign ownership in Vietnamese banks is capped at 30 per cent, while a single foreign strategic investor can own a 20 per cent stake at most. The government has several times said it would loosen the cap to make investment in a local bank more attractive."A number of foreign investors have shown interest in acquiring shares and we are holding talks with several renowned institutions," Son said. "We cannot reveal the price now and it will take years, not days, to complete the sale."The executive also denied rumours that LienVietPostBank would merge with Sacom-bank and noted that it would also not acquire a consumer finance company, as other banks have done, as it will make use of the 200 branches and transactions offices and the right to use 10,000 post offices of the Vietnam National Posts and Telecommunica-tions Group (VNPT) nationwide.


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On October 5, LienVietPostBank floated 646 million shares on the Unlisted Public Company Market (UPCoM) at VND14,800 ($0.65) a share. The bank had nearly VND150 trillion ($6.6 billion) worth of assets as at the end of August, and earned a pre-tax profit of VND1.29 trillion ($56.78 million) in the first eight months of the year.http://vneconomictimes.com/article/banking-finance/lienvietpostbank-plans-to-sell-25-stake-to-foreign-strategic-investor

VIB to buy up to 57 million treasury shares and cancel the bonus share distribution plan


On October 5th 2017, the Vietnam International Commercial Joint Stock Bank (code VIB on UPCoM) has completed taking comments of shareholders about the cancella-tion of the charter capital increase plan which was agreed at the 2017 annual general meeting, and approved the plan to purchase treasury shares at the ratio of 10.1%.Despite receiving only 92 valid votes out of 1,390 votes of shareholders, the owners of these valid votes represent up to 92.67 percent of VIB's charter capital. Except the four votes representing 29,092 shares voted against the plan to cancel the capital raising plan, other shareholders all agreed to the cancelation option. Regarding the plan to purchase treasury shares, only two shareholders holding 27,915 shares of VIB opposed to it.With over 90 percent ayes, both of the above plans were approved.According to the plan submitted to shareholders in the early year, in addition to the 5 percent cash dividends which were paid and 3.5 percent dividends in shares, VIB also expected to pay bonus shares from the surplus source and the fund to supplement charter capital with the ratio of up to 36.1%.In return, VIB now uses the capital from equity to purchase treasury shares. The amount of shares to be purchase does not exceed 10.1 percent of the current charter capital. The purchasing price is proposed to be decided by the bank's Board of direc-tors based on market price at the time of trading and based on the regulatory price frame of the law and of the Hanoi Stock Exchange.With 5.664 trillion dong of charter capital, the maximum amount of shares VIB expects to buy is 57 million units. The purchasing price has not been released. As estimated, with the current price of 21,500 per share (equivalent to the closing price on October 8th), VIB needs nearly 1.225 trillion dong to re-purchase its treasury shares.Previously, according to VIB's general director Han Ngoc Vu, the bank's foreign stra-tegic shareholder CBA does not have intention to make divestment. Vu added that although the purchase of treasury shares will temporarily lower the equity in the short term, the bank would own a very potentially valuable assets which are its own shares.Vu said that the bank will buy treasury shares from the objects that are allowed by the law, and best suit VIB's benefits. The purchase will be conducted before December 31st 2017 via matching order or put-through forms. VIB's share trading has gained a lot of attention lately.After Tran Thi Thao Hien, the wife of VIB's chair Dang Khac Vy received the transfer from her father Tran Bau, the son of the ChairDang Quang Tuanalso registered to buy up to 28.1 million shares of VIB from October 9th to November 7th. If Tuan successful-ly trades this amount of shares, the total number of shares held by Dang Khac Vy, his wife and son will be 84.2 million shares, accounting for 14.9 percent of VIB's charter capital.

2017 GDP growth target of 6.7pct in sight: NFSC


The National Financial Supervisory Committee (NFSC) anticipates gross economic growth of Vietnam in 2017 will be more than 6.7 per cent.The target, several months ago, was forecast to be beyond reach.NFSC said the government's policies to improve investment climate and promote businesses posted positive results and fuelled gross domestic product (GDP) growth through increasing demand.Consumption and investment demand will increase significantly in the fourth quarter of this year once the disbursement of construction capital was stepped up, together


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with anticipated improving exports thanks to advantageous developments in global trade. "Following impressive growth in the second and third quarters, GDP growth will touch 7.5-7.5 per cent in the fourth quarter of this year," NFSC said in the report, adding that growth for the full year would reach more than 6.7 per cent.NFSC also saw a stable trend in prices of goods in the remaining months of this year."If there are no sudden fluctuations in prices of public services in the remaining months, inflation in 2017 will increase at just 3 per cent," the report said.At a meeting early this month, the Vietnamese government said it was determined to achieve the target of 6.7 per cent GDP growth in 2017, urging comprehensive measures and hastened efforts to fulfill this goal.After posting GDP growth rate of 6.7 per cent in the third quarter of this year, the Vi-etnamese economy must grow at a minimum of 7.31 per cent in the last quarter to achieve its goal.According to Duong Manh Hung, deputy director of the National Account System De-partment under the General Statistical Office, NFSC's forecast had merit.There were new stimulators for economic growth in the last quarter, such as visa ex-emption for tourists from five European countries, anticipated loan interest rates cuts, increase in credit growth and ministries' efforts to reduce business prerequisites and fees, Hung said.NFSC's report said there was room to cut interest rates, given not-too-high exchange rate pressure and under-control inflation.In the first nine months of this year, loan interest rates decreased slightly by 0.5-1 per cent, especially for prioritised sectors.International organisations were upbeat on Vietnam's economic growth this year, but their projections were mostly lower than the government's targets.The World Bank East Asia and Pacific Economic Update on October 4 released their projected GDP growth rate for Vietnam in 2017, which was 6.3 per cent.The Asian Development Bank said in the Asian Development Outlook Update in late September that Vietnam's economic growth would also be at 6.3 per cent this year, 0.2 percentage points off from the previous forecast.HSBC early this month revised upwards its forecast for the country's economic growth to 6.6 per cent.http://bizhub.vn/news/2017-gdp-growth-target-of-67-in-sight-nfsc_289396.html

VN shifts away from agriculture


The economic structure in Vietnam's rural areas has been transformed in the past five years, with fewer people working in the agriculture, forestry and fishery sectors and more in construction, industry and services, according to the 2016 national census on rural areas, agriculture and fishery. The report was issued yesterday by the General Statistical Office (GSO).As of July 2016, as many as 8.58 million households in rural areas, equivalent to 53.7 per cent of the total, made their living in the agriculture, forestry and fishery sectors, a drop of 8.5 per cent compared with 2011. The number of households engaged in indus-try, construction and services increased 6.6 per cent compared with 2011, reaching 6.4 million households, equal to about 40 per cent.The number of rural labourers nationwide in the agriculture, forestry and fishery sec-tors dropped by 8.2 per cent, with a commensurate increase of 6.9 per cent in the number of industry-construction and service workers."The Red River Delta had the highest pace of economic structure switch from agricul-ture, forestry and fishery to industry, construction and services. Industrial parks and export processing zones employ labourers in rural areas, especially in Bac Ninh, Vinh Phuc, Hai Phong, and Hai Duong," said Nguyen Thi Huong, head of the GSO's Agri-culture, Forestry and Fishery Department.Larger scale productionThe census also demonstrates changes in structure and production scale in the agricul-ture, forestry and fishery sectors. There was an increase in the number of agriculture,


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forestry and fishery enterprises and cooperatives nationwide, whereas the number of households engaged in those fields decreased from more than 10.3 million to more than 9.2 million.Agriculture, forestry and fishery production was conducted on a larger scale. Among 3,846 agriculture, forestry and fishery enterprises nationwide, as many as 1,205 had production funds of more than VND10 billion (US$435,000).The census also points out that agriculture, forestry and fishery production has ap-plied Vietnamese Good Agricultural Practices (VietGAP), mechanisation and produc-tion value chains.However, deputy director of GSO Phm Quang Vinh said that in spite of the expanded scale of agriculture, forestry and fishery production, small-scale production is still common.Under-qualified labour is a major challenge for rural socio-economic development and for new employment opportunities, he said. Among more than 31 million rural labour-ers, more than 65 per cent are unskilled. Only 15,9 per cent have vocational training certificates or academic degrees.Rural inhabitants, especially in remote and mountainous areas, are still disadvan-taged. "About 23.6 per cent of rural residents have not accessed health insurance. Some areas lack clinics. There are even three communes in the northern mountain province of Dien Bien that have no healthcare facilities," said Nguyen Thi Huong.The census was conducted in July last year, involving nearly 16 million rural house-holds, one million urban households engaged in agriculture, salt making and fisheries, and nearly 33,500 farms and other units.The GSO also used data on production and business of agriculture, forestry, fishery en-terprises and cooperatives in GSO's nationwide business survey 2016.

9-months budget deficit falls sharply

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| VNEXPRESS

As per the report about the economic and financial situation in the first nine months of the year and the forecast for the entire year 2017 by the National Financial Supervisory Commission (NFSC), the state budget revenue has increased sharply over the same pe-riod last year.Cumulatively, in January-September, the total budget revenue touched 69.5 percent of the estimate, up 13.9 percent year-on-year (compared to 70.5 percent in the same peri-od of 2016, up 5.2%). The total budget spending reckoned for 65.1 percent of the esti-mate, up 6.6 percent (compared 68.4 percent in the same period of 2016, up 5.7%).With the aforementioned result, the State budget overspending in January-September is estimated at 61.5 trillion dong, equal to 34.5 percent of the estimate (compared to 152.2 trillion dong in the same period of 2016, equal to 59.9 percent of the estimate).The state budget overspending compared to GDP was low, only equal to 1.85 percent GDP (compared to 5.01 percent GDP and 4.94 percent GDP respectively in the same period of 2016 and 2015).The sharp decrease in state budget overspending compared to the same period last year was due to the following factors:First, the budget collection increases faster than the budget spending (in the same pe-riod of 2016, the spending was faster than the collection).Second, original debt is not included into state budget deficit since the fiscal year 2017. If including the payment of original debt, state budget overspending compared to GDP is equal to 5.8 percent GDP).However, as per NFSC's report, in the last months of the year, the implementation of state budget still exits some problems.First is the slow disbursement progress of basic construction investment (reaching about 162.9 trillion dong, equal to 46.3 percent of the estimate, much lower than the 54.5 percent and 64.8 percent in the same period of 2016 and 2015).Second is the revenue from the business and manufacturing sector decreases com-pared to the same period of the two previous years, mainly due to low revenue from state-owned enterprises (51.7 percent of the estimate).


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Export value likely to hit 203 billion USD this year


Vietnam's export value is likely to hit 203 billion USD in 2017, a year-on-year rise of 14.5 percent, economists predict.According to the General Statistical Office, export turnover enjoyed a year-on-year in-crease of 19.8 percent in the first nine months of this year, or 154 billion USD.Economists attributed the growth to Vietnam's participation in free trade agreements which encourage the business community to invest more in exports and seek new op-portunities.In addition, global commodity prices are rising, resulting in increases in export values.The Ministry of Industry and Trade said that the improvement of the country's busi-ness and investment environment and the simplification of administrative procedures have also aided businesses.Officials said national export value has high growth potential this year as Vietnam has advantages in exporting certain products, such as farm products, seafood, telephone components and garments.The most important aspect is that local exporters must reform themselves and make use of good opportunities in export markets.At present, Vietnam has exported its goods to some 200 countries and territories. Be-sides traditional markets such as the United States, the EU, Japan and the Republic of Korea, as well as China and the Asean, Vietnam has entered new markets in Africa and Latin America.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/export-value-likely-to-hit-203 billion-usd-this-year/119197.vnp

Vegetable, fruit export import turnover strongly increases

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| SGGP NEWS

Vegetable and fruit export turnover raised 44.2 percent to reach $2.64 billion since ear-ly this year while import was up 78.2 percent to hit $1.53 billion, creating a trade sur-plus of $1.49 billion.That was reported by Dr Nguyen Huu Dat, secretary general of Vietnam Fruit and Vegetables Association yesterday, at a meeting co-organised by the Ministry of Indus-try and Trade and European trade policy and investment support project (EU-Mutrap) discussing solutions to maintain and expand the export market of Vietnamese fruits and vegetables.According to Dat, Asia has been the largest export market accounting for 85.9 percent, Europe accounts for 3.8 percent and other markets 6.3 percent. Of the total export vol-ume, 46.9 percent are processed products and the remaining are fresh vegetables and fruits.Export turnover to the EU, Japan, the US and South Korea has showed signs of in-crease, especially in the EU market. In 2013, Vietnamese fruits and vegetables were limited from exporting to this market because of food safety and hygiene violations. However the situation has warmed up since early this year.Besides positive signs, Vietnamese businesses are among the group in danger of facing technical barriers related to food hygiene and safety standards, especially those ex-porting fresh fruits and herbs.Therefore, they should meet vegetable growing standards in shade net houses, have traceability and international certifications in plant quarantine. The EU has advised them to abide by VietGap farming process to minimise the risks that their products might be infected with pests and diseases.http://sggpnews.org.vn/business/vegetable-fruit-export-import-turnover-strongly-in-creases-70452.html

Rice exporters should diversify markets


Diversifying into high-value rice markets could be a boon for Vietnamese rice export-ers, experts have suggested.Vietnam earned 2 billion USD from shipping about 4.5 million tonnes of rice abroad in the first nine months of 2017, representing year-on-year rises of 18 percent and 19.6


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percent, respectively.The Vietnam Food Association (VFA) has set a rice export target of 5.7 million tonnes in 2017, up 800,000 tonnes compared to the previous year.China accounts for 38 percent of Vietnam's total rice exports with some 1.5 million tonnes worth more than 700 million USD.Apart from China, the Philippines and Malaysia are strong consumers of Vietnamese rice.From now to late 2017 and 2018, the VFA said the rice market will be led by demand from Malaysia, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, China and Africa.Vietnam's rice exporters will face fierce competition from Thai rivals. Cambodia also wants to enter Vietnam's traditional rice export markets.In the context of climate change, the Mekong Delta the largest granary of Vietnam, should focus on growing high-quality and high-value rice.Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Nguyen Xuan Cuong said "We can ac-cept reducing the area but have to increase rice value. This requirement is urgent to improve the livelihood of farmers."Experts said the rice sector needs to take measures to shift to cultivation of rice with higher value and food safety.More importantly, rice businesses should aim to produce high-quality rice using ad-vanced technologies.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/rice-exporters-should-diversify-markets/119192.vnp

Kien Giang boosts exports in remaining months


The Mekong Delta province of Kien Giang is striving to gross more than 42 million USD from exports in the fourth quarter of 2017, fulfilling its yearly target of 400 million USD.Head of the import-export office under the provincial Department of Industry and Trade Ngo Quang Binh said one of the most important solutions in foreign trade activ-ities in Q4 is providing key export businesses with global market information so that they can have flexible business plans and improve their competitiveness.Global import demand in the remaining months of this year is forecast to surge, ahead of the Christmas and New Year holidays, he said, adding that it is necessary to rein-force traditional markets while seeking new ones as well as long-term partners.Businesses should prepare seafood material, high-quality rice, and ensure food safety to supply for export processing plants, focusing on aquatic products with high eco-nomic values, he said.The province helps businesses access loans and has increased trade activities at the Ha Tien international border gate and Gia Thanh national border gate on the local border with Cambodia, he added.It also plans to carry out a project improving the competitiveness of Vietnamese export products, a rice export development strategy, and to establish a steering committee on international integration.In the first nine months of 2017, the export turnover in Kien Giang exceeded 357 mil-lion USD, a year-on-year rise of 38 percent, of which farm produce earned 136 million USD and aquatic products 144 million USD.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/kien-giang-boosts-exports-in-remaining-months/119187.vnp

VITAS recommends removing tariffs on polyester fibre


Vietnam Textile and Apparel Association (VITAS) has petitioned the Ministry of Fi-nance and the Ministry of Industry and Trade to not increase import tariffs on polyes-ter fibre from zero to 2 per cent.VITAS's move aims to remove difficulties for textile and garment enterprises, follow-ing feedback and recommendations of enterprises.According to VITAS, enterprises still have to import materials and produce goods do-mestically. However, many are being forced to close operation as they cannot bear the


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high cost and expense, such as the Dinh Vu Polyester Fibre Plant in the northern prov-ince of Hai Phong.VITAS has also proposed that the government consider not raising regional minimum wage in 2018 and consider adjusting the insurance premium rates paid by firms to a more reasonable level, so that enterprises can mobilise resources aand improve their competitiveness to expand production and create jobs in rural and mountainous areas.VITAS also recommended that the Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC) advise the government on the amendment of Decree 60/2014/ND-CP on the con-ditions for licensing the import of printers for textile products.According to this decree, the owner of a business will be allowed to import printers if they have a college diploma or higher in the printing industry or they must be granted a certificate of professional training by the MIC.http://bizhub.vn/news/vitas-recommends-removing-tariffs-on-polyester-fibre_289392.html

Efforts to stabilise market in year's end


The Departments of Industry and Trade have been urged to actively launch trade pro-motion and market stabilisation programmes and connect supply-demand in peak times.Due to rising political tension in the Korean peninsula and financial fluctuations in September, metal prices tumbled while farm produce and energy prices kept rising due to high demand in end of the year.Statistics showed that the total retail value rose 1.75 percent monthly to 336.585 trillion VND (14.63 billion USD) in September. Tourism, lodging and dining sectors grew 4.5 percent and 8.8 percent, respectively due to high demand on September 2 holiday. On the nine-month calculation, the figure hit 2,917,545 trillion VND, up 10.5 percent year-on-year.Trade experts forecast that goods market will be busy due to high demand.Deputy minister of Industry and Trade Do Thang Hai underscored the need to stabi-lise the market and generate abundant supply to meet public demand during year's end. He asked for considering adjustment of value-added tax on goods and services to prevent price hike and falling purchasing power.Ministries, agencies and localities were required to provide support for pig farmers and work closely together to control market and prices.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/efforts-to-stabilise-market-in-years-end/119232.vnp

Government support policies boost business growth


The government's solutions to support the development of enterprises has proven ef-fective, with a surge in the number of newly established firms in the first nine months of 2017.Pham Dinh Thuy, head of the Industrial Statistics under the General Statistical Office (GSO), said the improvement of investment-business environment assisted the busi-ness community and met enterprises' demand in the context of economic integration.According to the GSO, as many as 93,967 new enterprises were established in the first nine months of this year with total capital of more than 902.6 trillion VND (39.7 billion USD), a year-on-year rise of 15.4 percent and 43.5 percent, respectively.Average registered capital of each firm was 9.6 billion VND (4.22 million USD), a rise of 24.4 percent over the same period last year.At the same time, some 1.24 quadrillion VND (54.5 billion USD) was injected into more than 27,500 businesses, raising total capital pumped into the economy to 2.14 quadril-lion VND (94.16 billion USD).More than 21,100 enterprises also resumed operations in the first nine months of the year.Total employees of the newly-established firms in nine months were 886,500, down 4.5 percent over the same period last year.Of the total new firms set up in the first nine months of 2017, 33,900 operated in retail


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and wholesales, an increase of 17.3 percent, while 12,000 specialised in processing and manufacturing industry, up 9 percent, and 11,900 in construction, a rise of 12.7 percent.Experts said that to operate effectively, the new firms should focus on high-value sec-tors and creating trademarks.The Ministry of Planning and Investment has also built a project to reduce input costs for businesses and to improve the competitiveness of the economy.Additionally, efforts to build e-public services will be continued, which are expected to save both time and money for businesses in registering for business licences.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/government-support-policies-boost-business-growth/119190.vnp

More efforts needed to reach the skill gap in Vietnam


Amid increasing demand for talent from existing and newly established businesses, employers are facing challenges in finding the right candidates, according to a recent snapshot report on Vietnam's labour market by Adecco Vietnam, a subsidiary of Swit-zerland-based workforce solutions provider.In the first half of 2017, there was a mismatch between the talent sought by employers and available workers, especially in the technology and accounting, it said."Businesses are looking for talent, however, the lack of sufficiently skilled applicants has led to the mismatch between supply and demand," said Le Nguyen Ngc Thanh, recruitment business director of Adecco Vietnam."It is not only fresh graduates who need to boost up their skills, 51 per cent of employ-ers think even experienced candidates do not possess up-to-date knowledge and prac-tical skills required to perform their roles. Fixing the skills issues can lead to higher job satisfaction and improve company productivity and growth."The unemployment rate of youths with university training stands at an alarming rate of 17 per cent, the report said, noting that university and college curriculum is criti-cised for focusing too heavily on impractical theories while failing to provide students with pragmatic skills and knowledge.While Vietnamese candidates are viewed as quick to learn, soft skills, such as problem solving, communication and leadership are among the areas that are lacking and re-quire further training from employers.Vietnam's issues with the widening skill gap is also reflected in the Global Talent Com-petitiveness Index (GTCI) 2017, where the country's ranking of vocational skills de-clined from 95 in 2016 to 98 in 2017.Vietnam needs to get ready for a new wave of technology that will fundamentally change the way work is done, experts said.Research from the International Labour Organisation showed that 85 per cent of tex-tile, clothing and footwear workers in Vietnam are at risk of being replaced by auto-mation and robotics. White-collar workers are not fully immune either.While Vietnam's entrepreneurial spirit is strong, the country needs to bridge the gap between the education system and the economic needs of the future, according to Adecco.A look at countries ranked high on the GTCI in terms of vocational skills and talent readiness such as Germany and Switzerland shows a notable pattern those are coun-tries with a structured vocational/apprenticeship training programme that is aligned with their economic needs.In Germany, for example, after graduating from high school, students can choose to either go directly to university or apply for an apprenticeship with companies. Most of the students opt for the latter as they receive on-the-job-training over a period of time before going to university. Such programmes allow students to obtain practical knowl-edge, develop their soft skills while making the most of their academic training later on.Andree Mangels, general director of Adecco Vietnam, said, "At present, only less than 20 per cent of employers in Vietnam maintain regular interaction with general educa-tion and vocational training institutes.


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"The interactions are primarily focused on their short-term recruitment needs. More efforts are still needed to close the skills gap and structurally improve the quality of skill supply. Companies should be encouraged to work closely with educational insti-tutions to develop curriculum and training programmes that align with recruitment needs and ensure relevant skills are being taught to future workers."With Vietnam's current economic potential and growing workforce, issues with the skills gap and youth unemployment need to be addressed for the country to realise its potential.These tasks require a concerted and persistent effort among government, businesses and education institutions.http://vietnamnews.vn/society/405229/more-efforts-needed-to-reach-the-skill-gap-in-viet-nam.html

Global franchisers, retailers eye VN


With its rapidly growing economy and 95 million population of whom 60 per cent are young consumers, Vietnam is an attractive destination for global franchising and retail businesses.Speaking at a meeting in HCM City on Monday to introduce the 2018 Shop & Store Vi-etnam Expo, Suttisak Wilanan, deputy managing director of Reed Tradex, said many franchises in the food, education and other sectors are being established in Vietnam and the entry of more new brands is imminent."The spending habit of Vietnamese consumers is now moving towards modern retail and their demand is becoming more individualised," he said.So that provides an opportunity for global franchises, he said.Vietnam's franchise market has been ranked eighth by the International Franchise As-sociation.Figures from the Ministry of Industry and Trade show that 183 brands have registered as foreign franchises in Vietnam, mainly in the food and beverages, education, fashion, convenience stores, business services and hotel sectors.A majority of them are from the United States, Australia, South Korea, Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong, Canada and the Philippines.Nguyen Phi Van, founder and president of Retail and Franchise Asia, said: "Many for-eign franchise business delegations led by government agencies have come to Vietnam to seek opportunities in the sector."Countries in the region use franchising to export their business models and brands to the world since they have no longer export goods with low value, she said.The Malaysian government has, for instance, a full-year programme that states clearly how many business trips it would organise in a year to Vietnam to support businesses seeking franchisees."Many franchises in other countries in the region also want to enter the promising Vi-etnam market," she said.The sectors with the greatest potential are food and beverages, education, health and nutrition, business services, hospitality, fashion, beauty and skincare, entertainment, children's services, and convenience stores.The Vietnamese franchise market is still new, and local businesses do not have much understanding of or experience in it. There is also a shortage of human resources in the sector, she said.Shop & Store VietnamThe first Shop & Store Vietnam to be held in HCM City from March 28 to 30, 2018 would offer a good platform for foreign franchises to understand more about the Viet-namese market while local entrepreneurs could learn from successful franchises to build their brands, she said.Wilanan said the exhibition is expected to attract 200 local and foreign exhibitors, 40 per cent of them being local ones in a range of sectors.Organised by Reed Tradex, the event will showcase retail technologies, finance soft-ware, store management system, catering and hospitality equipment, professional re-


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tail services and e-commerce systems besides seminars on franchise and retail.The show would be an ideal platform for franchisors and retail technology providers to meet with the entrepreneurs.He encouraged local franchisors to promote themselves at the event.Franchising is a good opportunity for young entrepreneurs to run their own business by starting with something they believe in or can capitalise on the know-how and knowledge from successful franchisors, he added.http://bizhub.vn/news/global-franchisers-retailers-eye-vn_289394.html

Bumpy time for automobile market, smooth sale for used cars


Automobile traders are suffering tough times due to a slide in prices and sales, though the used-car market has been vibrant even during the seventh lunar month called Thang Co hon (Month of lonely spirits), more than 30 units sold per day.Despite promotions and discounts, new car sales in the first eight months of the year dipped six percent year-on-year to 177,000 units, according to the Vietnam Automo-bile Manufacturers' Association.Second-hand cars, from low-cost like Kia Mornings and Huyndai Grand i10s to pricey Land Rovers, Lexuses and Audis, have been for sale at showrooms on Duong Dinh Nghe, Nguyen Chanh, Pham Hung, Le Van Luong and Nguyen Van Cu streets in Ha-noi.Used car traders also slashed prices in the context of lower import prices for complete-ly-built-up (CBU) cars. Whilst automakers like Honda, Thaco and Huyndai slashed millions of VND off their best sellers, used car dealers cut 10-15 percent from their products.Although the Asean Free Trade Agreement taking effect at the beginning of 2018 will benefit automakers as tariffs on CBU cars imported from Asean nations will fall to ze-ro, second-hand car traders are not worried. They said the government still uses meas-ures to limit vehicle sales and increases in taxes on new cars remain a possibility.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/bumpy-time-for-automobile-market-smooth-sale-for-used-cars/119196.vnp

High growth expected for Vietnam's land lot segment


Many experts believe that the land lot segment has received significant attention from investors as evident from the increasing selling price and transaction numbers.Some even expect this segment could become "hot" in the near future.Statistics from the Department of Housing Management and Real Estate under the Ministry of Construction showed that in the first nine months of the year, total prop-erty inventory in the country was some 26.2 trillion VND (1.15 billion USD), of which inventory of land lots of more than 3.1 million square metres accounted for the highest valueequivalent to 12.5 trillion VND.Experts and commercial real estate services firms said the land segment has regained the attention of investors.Thuy Lien in Hanoi's Hoang Mai district said her family used to spend money on buy-ing apartments, which could later be sold for profit. However, she felt investing in apartments was no longer a safe and attractive option. Instead, she was now buying land lots as a new avenue to gain profit.She explained that a significant number of apartments had been sold, leading to satu-ration of the segment and low liquidity. In addition, the apartments were dependent on construction progress, investors' reputation and legal disputes, in spite of a high in-vestment value. Investing in apartments was therefore riskier than putting money into land lots.Those with strong financial capacity bought land lot projects that were progressing slowly, and were therefore available at low prices. They then waited for the projects to speed up to sell at higher prices.Land lots in new urban areas had the advantages of available infrastructure, transport con-nectivity and better construction density in comparison with the older residential areas.


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In addition, the land lot segment had attracted investors as it met both the targetsac-commodation and investment.Most Vietnamese believed that the value of land would increase more than the value of apartments.In the past two years, the "fever" for land lots has been witnessed in the three large cit-ies of Hanoi, Da Nang and HCM City.For example, HCM City saw a high demand for land lots in the city's eastern area, while the price of land lots in Thanh Ha Cienco 5 in Hanoi's Ha Dong district rose by 1.5 to two times in comparison with the initial price.Nguyen Van Dinh, vice chair of the Vietnam Association of Estate Agents, said the market had witnessed a fluctuation in the selling price since March, with land lots see-ing the highest increase.This market segment is expected to see impressive growth rate in the near future, Dinh said.He said State management agencies should have solutions to stabilise the segment to prevent "virtual" price hike, causing negative effects on the market.The ministry said localities should publish information on planning and progress of transport, infrastructure and property projects to prevent a "fever" for the land lot seg-ment.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/high-growth-expected-for-vietnams-land-lot-segment/119178.vnp

Vietnamese tourists embrace air charter trend

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| TUOITRE NEWS

While travelling to Vietnam via air charter is common for Russian or Japanese tourists, Vietnamese holidaymakers are now also taking up the trend as the expensive-sound-ing service is affordable for some.Local travel firms are organising overseas tours using charter flights for Vietnamese and have received positive feedback based on their timely schedules and reasonable prices.Healthy growthWhen invited to book a five-day package to Japan via air charter, HCM City resident Tran Thi Thu Trang was initially concerned about the quality of the tour.After discovering that the tour would cost VND26 million (US$1,145) per person, com-pared to the usual rate of more than VND30 million ($1,322), Trang made up her mind and eventually enjoyed the experience.One Vietravel representative said the company was enjoying strong sales for tours via air charter as tourists can depart on time with little chance of delays or cancelations.The tour company took some 700 air charter tourists to Japan's Fukushima in both 2016 and 2017, and expects to take some 3,000 visitors there between February and April 2018."The key feature of the air charter tour is that guests can save 30 percent on conven-tional packages," the company representative claimed.He added that Vietravel is expanding its air charter network from HCM City to Thai-land's Phuket, South Korea's Jeju and Lumbini, and Bodh Gaya in India.While most of the tour packages using air charter are for overseas destinations, Fidi-tour is taking tourists to the southern island of Con Dao."Air charter allows us to offer tours at reasonable prices with quality ensured, boosting our competitive edge," Fiditour's head of marketing Tran Thi Bao Thu said.Good price, great punctualityMany travel operators have confirmed to Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper that tours using air charter typically cost 30-35 percent less than conventional ones.According to industry insiders, tour organisers usually manage to make use of the re-turn leg of charter flights to bring outbound tourists to Vietnam.Under the current regulations, charter flights bringing tourists from overseas to Viet-nam must return immediately, rather than wait until the foreign tourists finish their tours.


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By arranging their own guests to travel on such return flights, Vietnamese travel firms are able to offer the tours at good prices.For instance, while the Hanoi Seoul round ticket normally costs some $350, the fare is only $200, including taxes and fees, on charter flights, leading to reasonably-priced tour packages.Another factor enabling air-charter travel firms to cut their prices is that the tours gen-erally always have at least 150 guests, allowing them to enjoy discounts from in-flight meal suppliers for example.Travel experts have said that only big companies with strong financial muscle are able to join the race to offer tours via air charter.Tour organisers have to attract at least 150 guests for their packages with charter flights to be profitable, meaning they risk losses if they pre-pay for the aircraft but fail to find enough passengers.http://tuoitrenews.vn/news/business/20171009/vietnamese-tourists-embrace-air-char-ter-trend/41964.html

Vietnamese farm produce seeks path to Middle East


With a total population of more than 400 million, the 16-country Middle East is a prom-ising market for Vietnam's farm exports, economic experts said.Statistics released by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development show that export-import revenue between Vietnam and the Middle East reached newly 10.89 bil-lion USD in 2016, up more than 100 percent from 2011.However, Vietnam mainly ships electronics and spare parts, and garments-textiles to the Middle East, which make up 68.4 percent of the country's export value to the region of 8.06 billion USD.Meanwhile, the region needs about 5-7 million tonnes of rice each year, along with vegetables, fruits, juice and seafood, which are among Vietnam's strengths.Vo Quang Huy, director of Huy Long An Co., Ltd, said the Middle East in general and Iran in particular are promising markets for banana exports, adding that his company used to deliver bananas to the region but had difficulties in the payment process.To export bananas to the Middle East, a company needs high-quality post-harvest preservation while bananas grow all across Vietnam, he said, noting transportation as another obstacle.Le Thanh, director of the Institute of Vietnam Organic Agricultural Economics, de-scribed the Middle East as an "attractive paradise" for Vietnamese goods and a huge market for the country's farm exports.However, he said, Vietnamese exporters still face barriers regarding logistics and pay-ment.Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development Nguyen Xuan Cuong, said the Middle East is a gateway to Europe, highlighting the potential for export-import activities be-tween Vietnam and the Middle East.Tran Van Tri, director of An Viet International Investment JSC and Chair of the Viet-nam-Iran Business Council, said Iran is a promising market for Vietnamese electronics, garments-textiles and agricultural products like banana, pineapple, lemon, rice and seafood.Iran imports about 1.2 million tonnes of rice each year, he said, adding that An Viet International Investment JSC, the first Vietnamese firm licensed in Iran, recently shipped 207 tonnes to the country and aims to deliver another 200,000 tonnes in 2018.He also said that payment issues remain the major barrier to bilateral trade.Le Quang Nhuan, general director of Louis Rice Import Export Co., Ltd, suggested Vi-etnamese exporters cooperate with each other to hire a transportation company, ex-plaining that transportation costs greatly impact on goods prices.According to the Commercial Counsellor at the Vietnamese Embassy in Iran, the coun-try imports about 600,000 tonnes of bananas and 300,000 tonnes of rubber each year, noting that Iran can buy up to 500,000 tonnes of Vietnamese rubber annually.Regarding the payment barrier, the State Bank of Vietnam said Vietnamese commer-


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cial banks put themselves at risk when conducting payment activities in Iran.The central bank is expected to support one or two commercial banks to establish co-operative ties and payment channels with their Iranian counterparts.Experts suggested Vietnam set up a production chain to ensure product quality, while paying attention to Halal certificates for the Muslim-majority countries in the Middle East.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/vietnamese-farm-produce-seeks-path-to-middle-east/119191.vnp

Polish businesses seek trade opportunities in Vietnam

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| VOV

Vietnamese and Polish agricultural businesses have reached a mutually beneficial agreement for the trade of fruit and dairy products. The deal was struck during a re-cent Vietnamese research trip to Poland to conduct a market survey.Spokesmen for Vietnamese business said that throughout the trip, a keen interest was expressed by their Polish counterparts to do more business in Vietnam.A representative from VIP Vietnam (Da Nang) Co, Ltd said the company have signed an agreement with Atibac International Trade of Poland on importing apple juice products into Vietnam.Both sides settled on the terms relating to the quantity, price, quality and delivery of produce. After checking the quality of products sent from Poland, Atibac's apple juice will hit the shelves of Vietnamese supermarkets in the near future.With the exception of apple juice, VIP Co, Ltd has also reached a consensus with Mle-kovita and Bumex on importing fresh and condensed milk products. The final cooper-ative agreement reached between the two sides is contingent on the successful passing of quality inspection from Vietnamese assessors.Pham DinhThanh, the Marketing and Business Development director of VIP Co, Ltd said there are further huge opportunities for cooperation between Vietnamese and Polish businesses, citing the success of Polish goods in having secured a firm foothold in many European nations as proof of the possibilities.According to statistics from National Support Centre for Agriculture (KOWR), Poland accounted for 30 percent of the market share of apples in the whole of the EU.They have seen further success in their exports, with Polish raspberry making up 61 percent of the EU's supply, strawberry 16 percent and cherry 33%. Poland is the world leader in blueberry production in terms of output, making up 73 percent of the EU market.A report by the general Department of Customs revealed that Poland earned $143.2 million from exporting their products to Vietnam in the first eight months of the year alone.Poland exported to Vietnam $26.5 million of milk and dairy products and $33.1 million of pharmaceutical products. Poland's key farm produce exports such as apple, straw-berry, poultry, and cattle remain modest.However, Tomasz Parxybut, general director of the Association of Polish Butchers and Meat Processors (SRW RP) said this trend would continue to develop as the demands of high quality meat products and other processed food have rapidly increased in Vi-etnam.This rapid increase looks set to continue as the EU has endevoured to speed up ratifi-cation of the Europe-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA), making it take effect in 2018. The move will be a boost to bilateral trade between the two countries, Parxybut noted.According to the EVFTA, frozen pork from EU to Vietnam will be duty free after 7 years, beef after 3 years and chicken after 10 years, further simplifying trade.However, Parxybut said despite the substantial reduction in tariffs, the export of these products to Vietnam cannot increase sharply due to high prices out pricing Vietnam-ese customers. But, with a population of 92 million in Vietnam, there remain huge op-portunities for frozen pork from Poland.A representative from Royal Apple brand name said Royal Apple have partnered with


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SVietnam finance & business 10 October 2017

Vietnamese businesses to build a sales distribution network. Although its products are sold in small quantity, the company has received positive feedback.The representative emphasized that the company will continue to promote these prod-ucts in Vietnam to seize opportunities from the EVFTA.Along with Royal Apple, several Polish businesses are seeking to open sales channels in Vietnam. Kazimierz Pietrek from the Export Department of the Celiko Company said after five months, the company has not received any response from customers on the design. However, he affirmed that Vietnam is still an attractive market for Polish businesses and many will continue to seek Vietnamese partners.http://english.vov.vn/economy/polish-businesses-seek-trade-opportunities-in-viet-nam-359987.vov

BUSINESSIZ NEWSBusiness Briefs 10 October, 2017

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA |

* Digiworld Corporation (DGW) has cooperated with Singapore's B2X Care Solution and Germany's B2X Care Solution Gmbh to establish B2X Vietnam Group operating in financial management consulting, marketing, human resources, production and com-puter sectors. The firm has total chartered capital ofVND6 billion, in which DGW owns 49.1 percent and the Singaporean and German partrrers hold 50.75 percent and 0.15 percent respectively.* Cat Loi Company (CLC) has plans to issue over 13 million shares to raise funds to buy machines and pay debts. The enterprise will issue around 6.55 million bonus shares at a 2- for-I ratio to sell 6.55 million shares to shareholders at VND20,OOO each. CLC expects to raise VND131 billion from the share sale.* Long Giang Investment and Urban Development Company (LGL) has sold over two million shares of Xu an Thuy Trade and Investment Joint Stock Company to reduce its stake to 19%, or over 866,000 shares. Earlier, LGL acquired shares ofNghia Do Trade and Investment Joint Stock Company to secure a 51 percent holding.* Sao Ta Foods Company (FMC) processed over 15,400 tonnes of shrimp in the 2016-2017 fiscal year, surpassing the 15,OOO-tonne target, and another 1,400 tonnes of other agricultural products.* Dai-ichi Life Vietnam and Saigon-Hanoi Bank have inked a straregie partnership deal allowing the insurer to distribute its products to the lender's customers in 15 years.* Vo Van Thang, chair of Thuong Phu Coffee Company (CTP), has registered to buy 500,000 CTP shares to raise his ownership to 10.9%. The CTP share price is around VND13,400 on the Hanoi market.* Minh Phu Seafood Corporation (MPC) has received approval to debut 70 million shares on the market for unlisted public enterprises on October 16. The initial price is set atVND79,OOO per share. In the January-June period, MPC earned a consolidated net profit of VND 144 billion from revenue ofVND6.34 trillion, up 7-fold and 34.5 per-cent year-on-year respectively.* PetroVietnam Southern Gas Company (PGS) made a pre-tax profit ofVND 106 billion between January and September, fulfilling 85 percent of the year's target. Its revenue reached VND4.25 trillion in the period, meeting 90 percent of the year's plan. PGS ex-pects to earn a pre-tax profit ofVND29.2 billion from revenue ofVND1.33 trillion in the fourth quarter of2017.

Financial stocks lift the market


Shares closed Monday's morning trade in a positive zone on the growth of financial stocks.The VN Index on the HCM Stock Exchange was up 0.11 per cent to 808.67 points.On the Hanoi Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index increased 0.47 per cent to 108.49 points.Nine of the 10 listed banks gained value, with the Big Four (four largest banks by mar-ket value and assets) Vietcombank (VCB), Vietinbank (CTG), BIDV (BID) and Military Bank (MBB) rising between 0.5 and 1.1 per cent.Only Nam Viet Bank (NVB) remained unchanged.Big securities companies such as Saigon Securities Inc (SSI), HCM Securities Corp


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(HCM), VNDirect Securities (VND) and MB Securities (MBS) also added value.On the defensive side, many large-cap stocks sank in the red and weighed on the mar-ket, including Vinamilk (VNM), VinGroup (VIC), Bao Viet Holdings (BVH), Masan Group (MSN) and FPT Corp (FPT).Liquidity was modest with a total of 118.4 million shares worth over VND2.4 trillion (US$105.7 million) being traded in the two markets.The afternoon trade session starts at 1pm.http://bizhub.vn/markets/financial-stocks-lift-the-market_289383.html

VN Index seen reaching 810 points this week

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| THE SAIGON TIMES

Securities firms have predicted the VN Index may test the 810-point level again as tech-nical factors indicate a further increase this week.Bao Viet Securities Company said listed enterprises are going to announce earnings re-sults in the third quarter soon with some expected to show positive results. Therefore, the VN Index may not enter into a deep correction in the near term.According to BIDV Securities Company, investors focused on banking, real estate, construction sectors and a number of speculative stocks last Friday.Despite a mild rise of the main index, market turnover kept sliding and decliners far outnumbered advancers. Banking stocks were key contributors to the VN Index and the total trading value.Though cash flow remained weak, investors picked stocks with possible good earn-ings results in the third quarter. This week, the market may continue moving flat with the main index challenged at 810 points and supported at 800 points, the brokerage commented.FPT Securities Company, meanwhile, predicted the VN Index would seesaw around the 805-point level to establish a stronger supporting zone around this level.In general, investors should stay cautious during the first sessions of this week and fo-cus on stocks having good fundamentals. Meanwhile, short-term players should wait for better signals.Last week, the VN Index added 0.42 percent at 807.8 points while the HNX-Index closed up 0.3 percent at 107.98. However, turnover plummeted on both exchanges, with matching volume averaging out at 123.6 million shares per session on the HCM City bourse and 46.6 million shares on the Hanoi market, down 12.9 percent and 21.3 percent from a week earlier respectively.Stocks corrected in the two first sessions as large caps declined amid cautious trading. However, the stock indexes then bounced back strongly, buoyed by banking stocks VCB, CTG, BID, MBB and ACB.According to the stock market news site at vietstock.vn, downside risks remained strong in spite of the index recovery. Correction pressure increased after the VN Index reached the 810-point level.On Friday, trading on the market was lackluster as sellers became active. Turnover fell strongly due to investor caution but bank stocks still sent the VN Index into positive territory.Foreign investors also left negative impact on the market as they sharply raised net selling. Notably, they net sold shares for the fifth consecutive week.During last week, they net sold nearly VND260.7 billion of shares on both bourses, in-cluding VND199.5 billion worth of shares on the southern market and VND61.2 billion on the northern exchange.http://english.thesaigontimes.vn/56490/VN Index-seen-reaching-810-points-this-week.html

Stock picture looking up on third quarter's earnings


Vietnamese shares went through a rough trading week with rising investor caution. However, the market is expected to move up this week when listed companies an-nounce third-quarter earnings.The benchmark VN Index on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange gained 0.32 percent Oc-


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tober 6 to end the week at 807.80 points, recording a weekly increase of 0.4 percent.The HNX-Index on the Hanoi Stock Exchange was up 0.95 percent to end last week at 107.98 points. It rose marginally by 0.3 percent from the previous week's closing.According to analysts and brokerage firms, October 6's gains on both exchanges were attributed to rising investor confidence in stocks that were expected to release good earnings reports.BIDV Securities Co (BSC) wrote in its weekly report that both indices remained posi-tive on the back of blue chips, and the benchmark VN Index could go up to test the 810-point level this week, but the growth is uncertain due to declining market liquidity. An average of 171 million shares were traded in each session last week, worth 3.06 trillion VND (136.2 million USD), down 17.8 percent in volume and 19 percent in value com-pared with the previous week.Expectations for the third-quarter corporate earnings reports will be the major driving factor this week, BSC said. PetroVietnam Southern Gas Co (HNX: PGS), flagship car-rier Vietnam Airlines (HOSE: HVN) and Viet Dragon Securities Co (HOSE: VDS) have already reported positive Q3 results."Some unofficial sources have reported that banks performed quite well in the past quarter, and this could boost the banking sector in the short term," BSC said.Bank stocks will have a chance to lead the markets up, according to Hoang Thach Lan, head of the individual investor division at Viet Dragon Securities Co, and Dang Thanh The, a senior analyst at Maritime Securities Inc.The told news site tinnhanhchungkhoan.vn that the government had tried to achieve a more lending-based economy to reduce its dependence on the oil and gas sector, as the energy sector had been performing badly in the recent years.According to the general Statistic Office, Vietnam's gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate in the third quarter was 7.46 percent, the highest quarterly increase since 2011."The GDP growth hike has boosted expectations for positive policy impact on the economy," The said. "As the intermediary that finances the whole economy, the bank-ing industry is clearly the beneficiary."Lan said that investors should pay more attention to the State-invested banks such as Vietcombank (HOSE: VCB), MB Bank (HOSE: MBB), Bank for Investment and Devel-opment of Vietnam (HOSE: BID) and Vietinbank (HOSE: CTG), as they are well sup-ported by the government to clear their bad debts and improve their business efficiency.Among those four banks, VCB still has room to grow, as the stock has not increased too much since the beginning of the year compared with the three other bank stocks, according to the two analysts.Statistics cited on cafef.vn showed that VCB had risen 12.5 percent since December 31, 2016, while BID, CTG and MBB have gained 45 percent, 37 percent and 80 percent, re-spectively, during the same period."VCB is expected to increase after remaining modest for such a long time," Lan said.

Surpassing 120 billion USD, Vietnam's stock market capitalisation is equivalent to 60pct of GDP


This number is released by the National Financial Supervisory Commission (NFSC) re-garding the capitalisation of the stock market by the end of September 2017. The Sep-tember stock market continued to grow with VN Index exceeding 800 points thanks to the rise of large-cap stocks and low-liquidity stocks.According to statistics of NDH, the capitalisation of stocks on Hochiminh city Stock Exchange by the end of the third quarter reached 2,606 trillion dong. On the Hanoi Stock Exchange, the capitalisation of listed shares reached 196 trillion dong, while the capitalisation of shares registered for trading on the Unlisted Public Company Market (UPCoM) rose 64.8 percent compared to early year, reaching nearly 500 trillion dong. In total, the capitalisation of all the exchanges reached over 120 billion USD.In addition to the main stock market, derivatives market, despite being newly put into operation, has been positively welcomed.


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On the bond market, the mobilisation was less favourable in September 2017 as the bond yields have been bottoming and the demand for government bonds from 15 years and more fell sharply.In the first three quarters of 2017, the State Treasury mobilised 147.129 trillion dong from the issuance of government bonds, completing 81.7 percent of the 2017 annual plan (183.3 trillion dong).The government bond market in the first nine months of the year also recorded some positive signals with the highest ever average bond tenor reaching 13 years (4.32 times higher than the 8.68 years recorded in 2016). At the same time, the bond yields fell across the tenors compared to 2016. Observing the bond yield curve, it shows that slope of the government bond yields in September was slighter than the beginning of the year, particularly for short tenors, reflecting an expectation for a well-controlled in-flation in 2017.In the first nine months of 2017, the total net buying value of foreign investors was es-timated at 1,450 million USD, including 790 million USD of bonds and 660 million USD of shares. This value increased by nearly 80 percent compared to the same period of 2016. In September alone, foreign investors' net buying value on the stock market reached an estimated of 33 million USD, including 12 million USD of net selling and 45 million USD of net buying value.The participation of foreign investors on derivatives market remained very modest. Data of the NFSC showed that from August 10th to September 22nd, the trading of for-eign investors only accounted for 0.07 percent of the total trading value of the market.The total market value of foreign investors' portfolio is estimated at 27.3 billion USD, up by approximately 33.8 percent compared to late 2016. The foreign ownership rate is estimated at 19.2 percent on the stock market and 5.3 percent on the bond market.

Net foreign capital in securities market rises 80pct y-o-y


The net foreign investment in Vietnam's securities market was estimated to increase by 80 per cent, year-on-year, to $1.45 billion in the first nine months of 2017.This was predicted by the National Financial Supervision Commission (NFSC). In its recent nine-month financial and economic report, the NFSC said that the total foreign investment pouring into the securities market included $790 million for bonds and $660 million for stocks.The net foreign purchase for securities assets in September was estimated at $57 mil-lion, including $12 for stocks and $45 million for bonds, NFSC said.The central-level financial supervision agency reported that the total market value of shares purchased by foreign investors was estimated at $27.3 billion, an increase of 33.8 per cent from the end of 2016.Foreign investors have purchased 19.2 per cent of the total shares on the stock market and 5.3 per cent of the total bonds on the bond market, NFSC said.The benchmark VN Index on the HCM Stock Exchange has passed the 800-point level on the back of large-cap stocks but trading liquidity has remained weak.The value of the stock market as of September 2017 was equal to 60 per cent of Viet-nam's gross domestic product (GDP), NFSC reported.Since it was launched on August 10, the derivatives market has been well supported by investors but foreign investors were still unwilling to take part in the new market's trading, NFSC said.Foreign trading between August 10 and September 22 was equal to only 0.07 per cent of the market's total trading value on the derivatives market.According to NFSC, mobilised capital from the government bond market in Septem-ber was low as the interest rates were bottoming and demand for long-term govern-ment bonds with a maturity of 15 years or more had declined strongly.In the first nine months, the State Treasury of Vietnam raised more than VND147 tril-lion ($6.53 billion) from the government bond issuance, completing 81.7 per cent of its year plan.


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Is there a new Korean investment wave in the stock market?

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| VIETNAMNET

Samsung Securities and Caldera Pacific will become the second largest investor when they acquire a 40 percent stake in Dragon Capital fund management company.According to an MPI (Ministry of Planning and Investment) report, there were 3,374 stake purchases and capital contribution deals made by foreign investors by the end of August, worth $3.5 billion, an increase of 101.3 percent compared with the same period last year.Japan, Singapore and South Korea are three of the biggest foreign investors in Viet-nam. While the Japanese are well known for the portfolio investments in Vietnamese businesses (Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ holds a 20 percent stake in VietinBank, Mi-zuho holds a 15 percent stake in Vietcombank and ANA a 8.7 percent stake in Vietnam Airlines), Singapore and South Korea are known for direct investment projects.These include Samsung's electronics and smartphone manufacturing projects and the five VSIP industrial zones developed by Sembcorp.Analysts noted that South Korea is expected to become a big portfolio investor in Vi-etnam as well. Sources said Samsung Securities and Caldera Pacific, a private invest-ment fund from Hong Kong, have acquired a 40 percent stake in Dragon Capital.Dragon Capital is expected to establish many funds to call for capital from South Korea to invest in Vietnamese enterprises.Analysts have every reason to predict a new portfolio investment wave from South Korea. Vietnam is an attractive market, especially when a number of state-owned en-terprises will become equitised from now to 2020. The shares of large conglomerates will be put on sale, including Sabeco & Habeco (brewers), PVPower (electricity), PVOil (oil & gas), BIDV (bank) and Vinamilk (dairy producer).There are many attractive business fields for South Korean investors to pour money, such as seaports, logistics, aviation and real estate.South Korean investors are now facing problems with their investments in China be-cause of political conflicts. Lotte nearly had to shut down its operation because of Chi-nese consumer reactions.South Korean investors are now trying to look for new investment opportunities to disperse risks amid the worry about conflict with North Korea. Dispersing properties to other countries, including Vietnam, is what South Korea is doing.The stock market is now attractive in foreign analysts' eyes. Bloomberg reported that Vietnam is the only Asian market that has lured inflows every month this year.With a series of new shares having entered the bourse, the market capitalisation value of the Vietnamese stock market has increased by 37 percent this year.Thomas Hugger from Asia Frontier Capital (Hong Kong) said that Vietnam attracts foreign investors thanks to interest rate reductions, FDI capital increase and reasona-ble prices for stocks.http://english.vietnamnet.vn/fms/business/187642/is-there-a-new-south-korean-in-vestment-wave-in-the-stock-market-.html

Kido Frozen Foods to pay 14pct dividend


Kido Frozen Foods (KDF) has declared a dividend of 14 per cent to shareholders for 2017.It will be paid next month.KDF has 56 million outstanding shares following its listing 56 on UpCom late last month.It reported pre-tax profit of VND168 billion ($7.3 million) for the first nine months of this year.The company remains the leader of the in-cream market with a share of 40 per cent.KDF is a subsidiary of giant food producer KIDO Group and owns the popular Merino and Celano ice-cream brands.The company plans to produce a new line of frozen products like sausages, canned foods and processed foods.http://bizhub.vn/markets/kido-frozen-foods-to-pay-14-dividend_289385.html


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Telecom operator VNPT schedules IPO in 2019


Telecom operator Vietnam Posts and Telecommunications Group (VNPT) expects to hold its initial public offering (IPO) in 2019, according to the group's chair Tran Manh Hung."There is still a lot of work to be done for the group's IPO, such as selecting advisors, valuating the firm and seeking a strategic partner," Hung told Dau tu (Investment) newspaper."The selection of advisors alone is a complicated process, as each component of the IPO plan will require a specific advisor to work on it. The VNPT will look for cooperation from foreign, reputable IPO advisors."He added that "the company will try to finalise its IPO portfolio and complete all the required procedures in 2018, then do the IPO in 2019", as there were still problems with the firm's IPO plan that required the government to make the final decisions.The preparation of the IPO will be carried out after the restructuring plan, which has been submitted to the Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC) and the prime minister, is approved, he said.To complete the restructuring plan, the VNPT has founded a board, which specialises in the firm's equitisation process, and asked its member companies to compile corpo-rate reports.The VNPT has completely restructured its three corporations, which are telecommu-nication services provider VNPT VinaPhone, network operator VNPT Net and value-added services provider VNPT Media.The VNPT has also proposed that the MIC establish a new corporation that would fo-cus on technology development and produce both software and hardware compo-nents. The establishment of the fourth corporation under the management of VNPT has got the green light from the MIC.After two years of restructuring, the information-technology sector of VNPT says it has made rapid and strong development in different fields.The business unit has been able to develop and provide software applications for the government, its agencies and ministries; smart city applications for provinces and cit-ies; and products for other sectors, such as healthcare and education.As part of the restructuring plan, the VNPT also wanted to hold 20 percent in Mobi-Fone to make up for the reduction of its charter capital when the latter split away in August 2014.Two years later, the VNPT proposed that the government allow it to spend parts of the income from the equitisation of MobiFone on the firm's business activities.Responding to the company's request, the prime minister has assigned the MIC to de-velop the equitisation plan for MobiFone and submit that plan to the government for review.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/telecom-operator-vnpt-schedules-ipo-in-2019/119182.vnp

Vietnamese consumers second-most optimistic in Asia-Pacific


Vietnamese consumers are the second-most optimistic in Asian-Pacific markets, ac-cording the latest survey on consumer confidence conducted by MasterCard.Vietnam's Consumer Confidence Index stood at a high level of 90.8 points, just after Cambodia with 93.1 points.The average points for Asian-Pacific countries were 66.9, a slight increase from 62.7 points reported six months ago, mainly due to bright prospects of the stock and job markets.From April-June 2017, MasterCard asked over 9,000 consumers aged 18-64 years from 18 Asian-Pacific countries to give a six-month outlook on five economic factors, includ-ing the economy, employment, income prospects, stock market and quality of life.The index is calculated on a scale of 0 to 100, with zero as the most pessimistic, 100 as the most optimistic and between 40 and 60 as neutral.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/vietnamese-consumers-secondmost-optimistic-in-asiapa-cific/119202.vnp


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Vietnamese women contribute significantly to economy


Vietnam has been growing at 6 percent plus over the past few years and this is indic-ative of the contributions of women to business and the economy, World Bank Coun-try director for Vietnam Ousmane Dione has said in a recent interview granted to the Vietnam News Agency.The following is the full text of the interview.Question: Why is it important to support women to start and run businesses? What do you think about the role of women-led businesses in an economy?Answer: Constraints on access to financial services for women lead to constrains on economic activitywhen women suffer, the economy suffers. When women do well, so-ciety benefits. Financial inclusion increases women's power to make decisions within the family, household, community, and within society. It is also well documented that female-controlled finances result in higher spending on household necessities such as food and water, and child welfare, including school fees and health care. Empowering women by giving them control over their finances is not just smart economics, it is key to ending poverty. Supporting women to start and run businesses contributes directly to this objective.Women led businesses play an important role in any economy. Formal and informal SMEs account for more than 90 percent of enterprises in the economy and contribute about 50 to 60 percent of employment in the world. Women-led SMEs make up a siz-able portion of this market. Of the approximately 40 million formal SMEs globally, about a third or 12 million, are women-owned. Seven million of these women-owned SMEs are in the developing world. Empowering female entrepreneurs, especially those in high-growth sectors, such as manufacturing or IT, has the potential to create jobs, increase incomes, lift millions out of poverty, and lead to greater economic and social transformation.Question: What do women entrepreneurs need to be successful in their business?Answer: Women entrepreneurial activity is often concentrated in low productivity sectors, such as restaurants and food services, with limited potential for growth in in-come and employment and that often operate informally. Moreover, empirical evi-dence suggests that female entrepreneurs are often facing many obstacles to grow their businesses from micro or small to medium or large productive enterprises with trans-formational economic impact. Empowering female entrepreneurs, paving the way for their business to growth, creating favourable conditions for women to enter high-growth sectors, are crucial for job creation, income increase and poverty reduction.Question: What do you think about Vietnamese women's potential for and capacity of doing business?Answer: Vietnamese women are extremely entrepreneurial and hard working. They contribute significantly to household income, and by and large they are supported by their husbands and families. Vietnam has been growing at 6 percent plus over the past few years and this is indicative of the contributions of women to business and the econ-omy.Question: Some women-run enterprises in Vietnam have moved to stretch their reach to the world such as Vietjet Air, TH True Milk and Vinamilk. What do you think about their performance?Answer: This is very inspiring and I think this is testament to the potential of Vietnam-ese women entrepreneurs and their positive contributions to the country economy. I also think that many Vietnamese women entrepreneurs can serve as role models for the next generation of younger women entrepreneurs. Further Regional Integration and Asean provide substantial growth opportunities and access to larger markets and value chains that can continue to provide growth opportunities for women led busi-nesses in Vietnam. It is imperative though that the government also recognise this po-tential and ease some of the constraints facing women entrepreneurs.Question: Vietnam ranked 19th in the Mastercard Index of Women Entrepreneurs 2017 and was placed 7th in terms of the rate of women business owners, 31.4 percent. What do you think about these rankings?


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Answer: This is impressive and Vietnam should congratulate itself for these rankings. Nevertheless, there is always room for improvement and to further move up the rank-ings by creating a conducive environment to foster women entrepreneurs.Question: What should relevant agencies of Vietnam do to encourage more women to do business?Answer: To encourage more women to do business in Vietnam, relevant agencies should:- Address constraints stemming from social norms and subjective preferences that are biased against women entrepreneurs,- Raise awareness of the business case for serving women-owned SMEs.- Support women entrepreneurs to cross over into higher value-added and more pro-ductive activities through the provision of business development skills (training on how to run a business),- Addressing constraints on access to finance for women, such as lack of collateral, re-ducing necessary documentation;- Articulating the market opportunity for serving women-owned SMEs will help fi-nancial institutions design tailored financial products and services- Addressing any other legal and institutional constraints that may constrain women entrepreneurs.Question: Does the World Bank have any cooperation programmes with Vietnam to support women entrepreneurship?Answer: A substantial proportion of women entrepreneurs remain unserved by finan-cial institutions in Vietnam. The World Bank has an extensive technical assistance pro-gramme to expand financial inclusion in Vietnam. Part of this support is to address the financing constraints for the Micro and Small Enterprise (MSE's) sector in Vietnam, of which a substantial proportion are led by women.MSEs are critical to the country's emerging market-based economy and are critical to contribute to employment, poverty reduction and growth, however in recent years we have seen slower growth in this important sector. Vietnam's Ministry of Justice report-ed that MSEs make up 97 percent of the number of enterprises with well over 400,000 businesses; roughly 67 percent, 28 percent, and 2 percent of businesses are micro, small and medium enterprises, respectively. Furthermore, the IMF reported that MSEs con-tributed to over 40 percent of the country's GDP in 2015 and made up 20 percent of Vi-etnam's total exports.Therefore this is an important sector to support.The World Bank Group is keen to take part in high level seminars and workshops to highlight the importance of women entrepreneurs and the need to support them draw-ing from other countries successful experiences.Thank you so much.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/vietnamese-women-contribute-significantly-to-economy/119193.vnp

Aviation authority to probe passenger data leaks


The Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV) will inspect local airlines over pas-senger data leaks this month.Data of many air passengers like phone numbers has been leaked to taxi firms and ho-tels. Therefore, CAAV has immediately come up with a plan to prevent similar inci-dents from happening in the future.According to CAAV, airlines and ticketing agencies always ask passengers for phone numbers to update them on matters such as flight schedule, security control, and lug-gage lost and found, among others.Passenger data leaks emerged in 2013 and continued into 2014 and 2015. Whenever passengers flew to Cam Ranh and Noi Bai airports, they could receive text messages from taxi firms offering transfer services.Airlines reviewed their booking systems and found some airline staff members and ticketing agencies leaking passenger data to taxi companies and hotels that then intro-duced their services to passengers by phone.


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These employees were sacked while the ticketing agencies lost their contracts.The transport ministry issued Circular 01/2016/TT-BGTVT detailing the civil aviation security protocol. In particular, airlines are responsible for protecting personal infor-mation of passengers. They only provide data of passengers, and senders and recipi-ents of cargo for competent authorities for aviation security and safety, anti-smuggling, anti-fraud and anti-crime reasons.However, the passenger information leaks have gone on to date as taxi firms have been able to obtain passenger schedules and phone numbers to solicit for shuttle services from and to Cam Ranh and Noi Bai airports. This is in violation of regulations on pro-tection of personal data of passengers.CAAV has asked airlines to review their procedures and regulations on passenger data protection. Besides, the aviation authority will team up with police to impose ad-ministrative fines and even file legal action against individuals who illegally purchase, sell, exchange and use data of air passengers.http://english.thesaigontimes.vn/56499/Aviation-authority-to-probe-passenger-data-leaks.html

Vietnam collects nearly 1.1 trillion VND in forest environment fees


Vietnam has collected nearly 1.1 trillion VND (48.4 million USD) from forest environ-ment service fees from water suppliers, hydropower companies and tourist agencies, accounting for 66.3 percent of the yearly plan, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) said.The figure is expected to increase from the estimated 1.2 trillion VND (52.8 million USD) in 2017 to 2 trillion VND (88 million USD) in 2018 as forest service fees will be raised for hydroelectricity companies.MARD minister Nguyen Xuan Cuong has directed the Vietnam Administration of For-estry (VAF) to review collection from forest service fees and have rational investment, especially in Muong Nhe (Dien Bien), Central Highlands and mangrove forest.The prime minister has decided to allocate over 1.2 trillion VND (52.8 million USD) for the forestry sector, fostering sustainable forest development and protection.To increase incomes from forests and protect forests sustainably, the VAF has complet-ed documents of the North Central Region Emission Reduction Programme to be sent to the World Bank's Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF).Earlier, the FCPF pledged to pay for emission reduction efforts with 60 million USD for 10.3 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent from 2018 to 2024.The North Central Region Emission Reduction Programme, the first regional-level REDD programme implemented in Vietnam, aims to reduce emissions and absorb about 33.06 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent.The country has benefited from forest products and forest environment service fees. It exploited 13.2 million cubic metres of forest in the first nine months of the year, up 10 percent from the same time last year, and earned 5.76 billion USD from export of forest products, a year-on-year surge of 10.6 percent.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/vietnam-collects-nearly-11 trillion-vnd-in-forest-environ-ment-fees/119233.vnp

HCM City to ban pork without clear origin at wholesale markets


Pork without traceability tags will be banned at Hoc Mon and Binh Dien wholesale markets in HCM City from October 16, said HCM City vice chair Tran Vinh Tuyen.Tuyen has directed relevant departments and agencies, and the two markets' manage-ment to cooperate closely to continue the pork origin tracking scheme.He has assigned the market monitoring force and police to cooperate with Long An Province law enforcement to compel vendors to comply with the relevant regulations. Heavy sanctions should be imposed on those who transport pigs and pork to the city without licenses and tax payments, and especially those who have had fraudulent practices like pumping water into pigs to increase their weight.The city government has passed a plan to support farmers to cover 50 percent of the


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traceability tag cost and cooperatives 100 percent of the cost until December 31.The municipal Department of Industry and Trade earlier proposed the city govern-ment ban the sale of pork without clear origin at wholesale markets in the city.The department on October 3 suggested market stabilisation solutions in a document submitted to the city government during the shutdown of Xuyen A Slaughterhouse in Cu Chi District. Competent agencies had caught red-handed two merchants injecting 4,000 pigs with a sedative solution right before slaughtering them.The city required relevant agencies to immediately cull the contaminated pigs and publish 13 vendors involved in the case.The department has worked with large farms in the city and neighbouring areas. These farms have pledged to adequately and quickly supply pigs to slaughterhouses in the city.Nguyen Ngoc Hoa, deputy director of the Department of Industry and Trade, said the department has also worked with supermarkets to ensure the supplies and price sta-bilisation. The agency will inspect closely pork supplied to the city in the near future.http://english.thesaigontimes.vn/56501/HCM City-to-ban-pork-without-clear-origin-at-wholesale-markets.html

More milk tea shops open in Vietnam

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| VIETNAMNET

More and more milk tea shops have opened recently, even though the selling price is relatively high for the majority of Vietnamese.Trung, 50, who has been working as a taxi motorbike driver for three years, earning VND200,000-300,000 a day, recently began earning extra money delivering milk tea."After lunchtime, a group of office workers often asks me to buy milk tea for them. The shop is on Ngo Duc Ke street, about one kilometer away," he said, adding that he re-ceives VND20,000 for the delivery service. He receive 4-5 orders every day."Young women, especially office workers, like milk tea very much," he said.Milk tea first appeared in Vietnam in the early 2000s. However, there were only small privately run shops which prepared milk tea at low prices.The milk tea movement returned in the last four years with the presence of many in-ternational brands such as Dingtea, Chago, Gongcha, Igongcha, Royal Tea and Tea Story.Besides the franchise shops, a Vietnamese owned company Golden Gate which is run-ning 20 restaurants, has also announced its Yu Tang brand. KFC has also launched its own milk tea brand.Lozi, the developer of a food app, found from a survey that there are 1,500 milk tea shops across the country, and more will join the market in the time to come.Fifty three percent of surveyed people said they drank milk tea at least one time a week. From early 2017 to the end of June, eight milk tea shops opened in Hanoi every month.Some 'milk tea streets' appeared in Hanoi and HCM City. The business of the shops is so good that the retail premises rent in the areas has been escalating. A report showed that the real estate prices in some milk tea areas increased by 25-71 percent compared with the same period last year.The land on Ngo Duc Ke street in the central area of HCM City, one of 'milk tea streets', is now priced at VND762.4 million per square metre. The other milk tea streets are Phan Xich Long in Phu Nhuan district and Su Van Hanh in district 10.A representative of Gong Cha in Vietnam said in the past, milk tea was the drink for youth and students, but now, office workers and middle-aged people also order it.A survey conducted by Q&Me, a market survey firm, showed that people aged 30-39 have the highest level of recognition of milk tea brands.http://english.vietnamnet.vn/fms/business/187582/more-milk-tea-shops-open-in-viet-nam.html


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Emigration of highly-skilled individuals quite high


World Bank report notes skilled Vietnamese workers are keen to head elsewhere if op-portunity arises.Emigration rates of highly-skilled individuals in Vietnam are quite high, at 10 per cent, according to the latest report from the World Bank entitled "Migrating to Opportuni-ty".The report indicated that easing restrictions on labour migration can boost workers' welfare and deepen regional economic integration.Approximately $62 billion in remittances were sent to Asean countries in 2015, ac-counting for 10 per cent of GDP in the Philippines, 7 per cent in Vietnam, 5 per cent in Myanmar, and 3 per cent in Cambodia.The impact of labour mobility on the region's economies can be significant, as migra-tion could provide individuals from lower-income countries with the opportunity to increase their earnings."No matter where workers wish to migrate in Asean, they face mobility costs several times the annual average wage," said World Bank Economist for Social Protection and Jobs Global Practice, Mauro Testaverde, the lead author of the report. "Improvements in the migration process can ease these costs on prospective migrants, and help coun-tries respond better to their labour market needs."The report estimates that reducing barriers to mobility would improve workers' wel-fare by 14 per cent if only targeting high-skilled workers and by 29 per cent if including all workers.The World Bank said a range of policies can be implemented to enhance workers' mo-bility and more oversight of recruitment agencies is needed across the region. "Viet-nam can benefit from a national migration strategy to guide reforms," the report noted.Vietnam, according to the World Bank, will need to evaluate its current policies for in-centivising out-migration to determine whether they are meeting the country's needs.While the intention of these policies is laudable, other reforms are also necessary, in-cluding a review of recruitment agencies' frequent and at least tacitly sanctioned prac-tice of requiring migrant workers pay a security deposit to guarantee their return, which is frequently not repaid. A national migration strategy could help to guide re-forms.http://vneconomictimes.com/article/vietnam-today/emigration-of-highly-skilled-in-dividuals-quite-high

Quang Nam ensures food safety, hygiene for Apec


The health authority in the central province of Quang Nam has played an active role in ensuring food safety and environmental sanitation, and preventing disease out-breaks ahead of a series of Apec events held in the province from October 18 to No-vember 11.Quang Nam will host the Apec Finance ministers' Meeting and Related Meetings, the Apec Voices of the Future 2017, the Days of the Republic of Korea in Quang Nam and the launch of the "super project" Blue Whale Gas Field.Since the beginning of October, the provincial Health Department has held operations to clean up the environment.It also directed inspection of state management on food safety in local districts, town-ships and cities where the major events will take place. Samples of water used in foods and drinks served in the events have been tested while hotels and restaurants have been guided to follow strict safety standards.The department will continue intensifying inspections from communal to provincial levels to minimise any risks associated with food hygiene during the Apec activities, said deputy director of the department Nguyen Van Van.The local 115 Emergency Centre has set up two teams watching out for any emergency in the province.About 300 international and domestic delegates, including financial ministers, leaders of financial agencies and central banks from 21 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation


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economies, will gather for the Apec Finance ministers' Meeting and Related Meetings from October 19-21 in Quang Nam.Established in 1989, Apec comprises 21 economies, including Australia, Brunei, Cana-da, Chile, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Malaysia, Mex-ico, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Peru, the Philippines, Russia, Singapore, Chinese Taipei, Thailand, the US, and Vietnam.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/quang-nam-ensures-food-safety-hygiene-for-apec/119230.vnp

Open policies for Van Don special economic zone


Van Don island district in the northern province of Quang Ninh has received approval to set up a special administrative-economic zone. With open policies and incentives, the zone is set to become a dynamic area in the country.With good road, aviation and sea links as well as rich natural resources, the 2,000 sq. km Van Don district has potential for developing luxury tourism and the sea-based economy.After getting the permission to set up the special administrative- economic zone from the Political Bureau, the district issued incentives and policies to facilitate investors, the highlight of which is administrative reform.Ngo Quang Hung, an investor, said administrative procedures were conducted quick-ly in the locality. "When I bought property here, I received support from the commune level People's Committee in transferring ownership, the notary public's office and bank system work until 8 pm, which is very convenient for investors," Hung said.Together with developing a modern and simply-structured governing body, the local-ity's investment policies have proved effective, attracting big domestic and foreign in-vestors.Quang Ninh provincial authorities have paid heed to nine groups of specialised poli-cies for the zone, especially those relating to finance and land leasing. "Land leasing time for each project will last at least 70 years, while exemptions for land leasing fee will be applied for three-years of the project's infrastructure building," said deputy Head of the Quang Ninh provincial Economic Management Board Hoang Trung Kien.According to experts, the successful establishment of the Van Don special administra-tive-economic zone will play an important role in international economic integration. "There should be specialised policies especially for special economic zones," said eco-nomic expert Cao Sy Kiem. "This will create new drivers of growth."It is estimated that Quang Ninh needs 12 billion USD to develop the zone in 2014-2030. Earlier, two other special administrative-economic zones, Bac Van Phong in the central coastal province of Khanh Hoa and Phu Quoc in the southern coastal province of Kien Giang, were given approval for establishment.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/open-policies-for-van-don-special-economic-zone/119234.vnp

Vietnam's German-made smart cities

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| VIR

Cities have played an important role in human society for centuries. But it is only re-cently that the majority of the world's population has begun to live in such close prox-imity. The following question, therefore, comes to mind: are cities capable of coping in the 21st century?Any local in Hanoi or HCM City (the two largest cities in Vietnam) will tell you about the difficulties of getting around those places, as the roads struggle to deal with the masses of bikes, buses, and cars, the numbers of which seem to increase with each passing year.And that's just one of many issues. Dense traffic and other factors cause pollution. Heavy rain in the rainy season sometimes causes flooding and, even if it does not, puts pressure on the drain and sewer systems. Infrastructure, while acceptable in a few places, has generally not kept pace with other developments, and there are increasing needs for electricity and decent internet coverage.


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When one understands that Hanoi and HCM City contribute over a quarter of Viet-nam's GDP, it is clear that what may seem like trifling matters individually, deserving of no more than a heavy sigh, together have real potential to cause a deep and long-term negative effect on the Vietnamese economy as a whole.But this is only one side of the story. Earlier this year, HCM City and Hanoi were ranked second and eighth, respectively, in the JLL City Momentum Index, an index which ranks cities worldwide on how well they attract and integrate technology and innovation.So with improvements needed in infrastructure, but with strong capabilities in tech-nology, it is no surprise that Hanoi and HCM City (and Vietnam more generally) have embraced the concept of smart cities. The term "smart city" is somewhat nebulous, but essentially refers to a city which uses technology to make life better and easier for the residents of the city and the city as a whole.The government in Vietnam has been quick to see the upside of creating smart cities. In 2015, prime minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc issued a decision to begin the implemen-tation of smart city concepts. Off the back of this and other supportive legislation, around 20 cities and provinces in Vietnam have launched projects to build smart cities, and it has been announced that a number of technology, infrastructure, and IT busi-nesses have signed deals related to such ventures.At a local level, things are moving quickly, too. The local government in HCM City, for example, has set up a smart city steering committee. It has announced plans to im-prove the city's IT infrastructure, and plans to integrate traffic cameras and sensors into a system which collects data to monitor traffic density in real-time. These systems will also be used to better manage things like the city's power usage and waste man-agement capabilities.But one thing is quite clear: cities in Vietnam will need outside help to achieve their smart city vision. This is because international partners are able to bring more money to a venture than their Vietnamese counterparts, and they are usually more experi-enced in dealing with the complexity of changes to infrastructure that are required.The good thing for international investors is that Vietnam is well aware of this. Earlier this year, the EU launched a project called "World Cities Vietnam", under which Hanoi and HCM City have been paired with two European cities, Milan in Italy and Košice in Slovakia, with the aim of enhancing cooperation and good practices on urban devel-opment, including smart city concepts.Hanoi People's Committee Chair Nguyen Duc Chung, when speaking at a working session in the EU last year, said that Hanoi is keen to partner with small- and medium-sized enterprises in Europe to improve its IT infrastructure along with other smart city needs.There are certainly opportunities for German companies to get involved in developing smart city concepts in Vietnam. Germany is already the fifth-largest investor in Viet-nam, with a total registered capital of around $1.4 billion, and the quality of German engineering and technology is world-renowned.Smart city concepts are already being developed in Berlin, Hamburg, and Frankfurt as well as in a standalone smart city development, Telekom City, located in the city of Friedrichshafen, which has provided a single testing ground for smart city concepts in administration, traffic, and networked homes.Finally, German firms are already gaining experience in developing smart cities over-seas through a plan, announced last year, in which Germany will help carry out smart city initiatives in a number of cities in India.To be sure, there will be challenges in developing smart cities in Vietnam. So far, most projects in Vietnam involving international partners (involving smart city concepts or not) have been small technical projects built around development aid. But smart city projects will need to be big to work effectively.How the project will be structured as a business model is also rather untested. To many people, smart cities in Vietnam have so far mostly been a case of "all talk and no ac-tion". The local authorities will likely have some idea in high-level terms as to what


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they want, but the specifics might not have been developed yet. And of course, in Vi-etnam, things always take time.But there are certainly encouraging signs for German investment in Vietnam. Just next to the Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer office in HCM City is the recently-opened Deut-sches Haus Ho-Chi-Minh-Stadt (German House HCM City). An international-grade office building and the new home of the German Consulate, it has been designed as the focal point for German-Vietnamese strategic and business relations.There could be no better evidence of one country's seriousness for its ambitions in Vi-etnam than this new high-tech building, and perhaps, one day, people will look at Deutsches Haus as the beginning of a new period in the development of Vietnam, one in which smart cities, and the technologies of the future, started to become a reality.http://www.vir.com.vn/vietnams-german-made-smart-cities.html

EuroCham opens Hai Phong chapter


The European Chamber of Commerce in Vietnam, EuroCham, opened a new chapter in the northern port city of Hai Phong last week. This is its second regional branch after a central Vietnam chapter was launched in November.Representatives of EuroCham also participated in the ground-breaking ceremony of the Deep C Industrial Zones, and toured the new industrial facilities around Hai Phong, most notably Lach Huyen Port and Tan Vu Bridge.They also met with business leaders, local authorities and European diplomatic repre-sentatives to discuss the potential of the north-eastern region of Vietnam as a prime in-vestment destination.Experts and officials discussed local investment practices, tax incentives, talent man-agement, real estate development and new infrastructure projects, providing a unique opportunity to hear from experts and government representatives about the current business potential of Hai Phong and northeastern Vietnam.The region is well-positioned to become the next leading destination for business, trade and investment in Vietnam, and EuroCham has taken a decisive step to ensure support for its present and prospective members involved in business in the country's north-eastern region.http://bizhub.vn/news/eurocham-opens-hai-phong-chapter_289381.html

Vietnam & Netherlands establish Fresh Academy


Training centre to support sustainable development in Vietnam's agriculture sector.Fresh Academya training centre focused on knowledge and practical application to support the development of Vietnam's agriculture towards becoming a sustainable and advanced sectorhas been officially established.With the support of the Dutch government, since 2015 a group of training organisa-tions from Vietnam and the Netherlands have come together to prepare for the estab-lishment of the Fresh Academy. The long-term goal is to provide training in all key areas of agricultural production throughout the country.The Fresh Academy offers practical training sessions for private sector organisations (farmers/ producers, distributors/ traders, retailers and service providers) as well as the public sector and NGOs active within the agricultural sector.Dutch partners include HAS University, Wageningen University, Lentiz Group, De-monursery Westland, and Kenlog BV. On the Vietnamese side are Fresh Studio and four agriculture and forestry universities: Da Lat University, Dong Thap University, the HCM City Agriculture and Forestry University, and the Vietnam National Univer-sity of Agriculture.At the launch ceremony, Ambassador of the Netherlands to Vietnam, H.E. Nienke Trooster, congratulated those involved in the establishment of Fresh Academy and said that this is a great opportunity for farmers and agricultural enterprises in Vietnam and the Netherlands to exchange experience to develop sustainable agriculture."This is the start and there are some obstacles ahead," she said. "But we are convinced that successful models such as Fresh Academy will provide the basis for the success of


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Vietnam's agricultural sector in the years to come."Vietnam and the Netherlands have close cooperative relations in agriculture. Water, agriculture, and climate change were the most important matters discussed during the official visit by prime minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc to the country in July.The two signed a strategic partnership agreement in sustainable agriculture and food security in 2014, involving Dutch help in responding to climate change, among other things.The Netherlands is also among the largest European investors in Vietnam, ranking eleventh out of the 119 countries and territories investing in the country, with 287 projects worth $7.7 billion.After establishing diplomatic ties with Vietnam in 1973, the Netherlands began pro-viding non-refundable ODA to the country, mainly in humanitarian activities, educa-tion and training, and healthcare.http://vneconomictimes.com/article/vietnam-today/vietnam-netherlands-establish-fresh-academy

Vietnam Railways in grave need of restructuring


With its cumbersome and ineffective apparatus, Vietnam Railways (VNR) plans to re-structure its operations to resurface and regain market share.Pressure for changeAfter many years of declining revenue and profit, VNR's business operations have produced positive signs. Notably, in the third quarter of this year, VNR reported in-creases in both passenger volume (3.77 million) and handled cargo (1.79 million tonnes), up 2.2 and 17 per cent on-year, respectively. As a result, in the third quarter of 2017, VNR reported a revenue of VND1.45 trillion ($63.7 million), up 13.8 per cent on-year."Instead of continuing to supply existing low-quality services of the railway industry to passengers as before, VRN now tries to upgrade facilities and service quality to meet passengers' demand," said Vu Ta Tung, VNR's general director.Accordingly, VNR has been recently focusing on increasing its market share in medi-um-distance routes as well as upgrading material facilities and service quality and launching promotion programmers to attract passengers.However, these short-term solutions are not enough to help VNR regain its position in the transportation sector and improve its business results in the long-term. They are not even enough to help VNR fulfill the annual targets as the fourth quarter is always considered the transportation industry's off-season with the lowest revenue.VNR transported 7.75 million passengers and four million tonnes of cargo, making a total revenue of VND3.1 trillion ($136.1 million), a slight increase on-year.Another issue affecting the railway industry in general and VNR in particular is low labour productivity, necessitating heavy-handed reforms.Notably, as of mid-September 2017, the railway industry employed 19,858 people, who in the nine months of this year fetched an average revenue of VND150 million ($6,585) each, a record low in the transportation industry.Resolution for its restructuringAccording to Vu Anh Minh, chair of the board of VNR, along with outdated material facilities, the cumbersome and ineffective apparatus is one of the major factors ham-pering VNR's development.Notably, VNR currently has 8,270 employees and holds a controlling stake in 24 mem-ber companies as well as 10-49 per cent in dozens of other companies.Specially, Hanoi Railway Transport JSC (Haraco) and Saigon Railway Transport JSC (Saigon Railway) are two outstanding examples of VNR's ineffective management practices. Both companies have offices in the same place, offering identical passenger and cargo services, posing unnecessary competition to each other. As a result, two years after of their equitisation, both companies reported declining revenue, market share, as well as employees' income.Furthermore, despite having advantages in terms of infrastructure, warehouses, and


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land fund to develop the logistic service, the sector's efficiency is quite low due to the management team's lack of professionalism.In order to solve these above problems, VNR released numerous solutions to advance restructuring.The first is the merger of Haraco and Saigon Railway into Railway Transport JSC spe-cialising on cargo transport.Second, VNR will reduce its holdings in member companies in the mechanical sector below 50 per cent.Third, VNR will maintain the organisation model and its holdings in railway mainte-nance companies, while simultaneously divesting its entire holding in member com-panies where it does not hold a controlling stake.http://english.vietnamnet.vn/fms/business/187967/vietnam-railways-in-grave-need-of-restructuring.html

RoK liquor maker opens Korean-style soju bar in Vietnam


Hite Jinro Co., the leading liquor maker in the Republic of Korea (RoK), said on Octo-ber 9 it has opened its first overseas soju pub in Vietnam, setting a goal to open over 20 such bars in the emerging market by 2020, RoK news agency Yonhap reported.According to Yonhap, the Korean-style street bar, called pojangmacha, opened in the capital city of Hanoi with a localised concept and design, after running a pop-up store in late 2016.The liquor maker said it will open the second street bar next year and increase the number of stores to over 20 by 2020."We will localise the street bar to raise brand awareness among locals and introduce Korean drinking culture to take the lead in Vietnam's soju market," Ahn Ju-hyun, the chief of Hite Jinro Vietnam was cited as saying.Its Vietnamese branch logged 2.93 million USD of sales in the first half of this year, al-ready surpassing last year's 2.42 million USD sales.https://en.vietnamplus.vn/rok-liquor-maker-opens-koreanstyle-soju-bar-in-vietnam/119204.vnp

UPS bolsters export & import services in central and southern region


Company expands services to ten additional central and southern provinces.Global logistics service provider UPS has recently announced in will enhance its serv-ices in ten provinces in central and southern Vietnam: Ba Ria Vung Tau, Binh Dinh, Binh Duong, Binh Phuoc, Dong Nai, Quang Ngai, Quang Nam, Tay Ninh, Thua Thien Hue, and Tien Giang.The company has cut transit times for export and import shipments within Asia from two days to one and improved shipment times from Europe from three days to two. In addition, the cut-off times for pick-up have been extended by up to three hours. This service enhancement is part of UPS's long-term strategy to provide local small and me-dium-sized enterprises with greater access to global trade."As a trade enabler, UPS is focused on reducing barriers for businesses looking to en-gage in cross-border commerce," said Daryl Tay, Managing director of UPS Vietnam. "The Vietnamese government has expressed a commitment to pursue 6.7 per cent GDP growth. Positive discussions are taking place around easing inter- and intra-regional trade with the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the EU-Vi-etnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA). We remain confident that trade will continue to flourish with Vietnam's growing middle class and shifts in manufacturing."UPS also recently enhanced services in nine northern provinces, bringing the compa-ny's presence to 19 provinces in the country."Suppliers are under increasing pressure to provide more products and services of higher quality, at greater speed and at lower cost," Tay added. "By offering later export cut-off times and improved transit times, UPS's customers in Vietnam can extend their production lead times to process more orders and still deliver goods to satisfy their end-consumers' needs. When combined with UPS's broad range of logistics solutions,


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retail, high tech, industrial and automotive manufacturers can maintain an agile and robust supply chain while enjoying competitive advantages in the international mar-ketplace."Vietnam is the EU's second most important trading partner within the ten-member Asean bloc, and is one of the world's fastest-growing economies. UPS's latest expan-sion of the UPS Worldwide Express Plus(TM) service saw its earlier morning deliver-ies expanded to 28 new countries, including Vietnam, and enhanced in 25 existing countries including China, Japan and the UK.UPS is a global logistics service provider, offering a broad range of solutions including transporting packages and freight, facilitating international trade, and deploying ad-vanced technology to more efficiently manage the world of business. Headquartered in Atlanta, US, UPS now serves more than 220 countries and territories worldwide.http://vneconomictimes.com/article/business/ups-bolsters-export-import-services-in-central-and-southern-region

Idemitsu Q8 officially joins Vietnamese petroleum retail sector


Foreign investors' joining the retail distribution of petroleum is expected to break do-mestic distributors' dominance, heating up the competition in this sector.Newcomer kicks the hornets' nestOn October 5, Idemitsu Q8 Petroleum Limited Liability Company (IQ8), a joint ven-ture between Japanese company Idemitsu Kosan Co., Ltd and Kuwait Petroleum In-ternational Ltd (KPI), held the opening ceremony of the first Idemitsu Q8 service station at Thang Long Industrial Park, Hanoi, marking the first station of a petroleum retail network named IQ8 that will spread across Vietnam.The move is expected to create competition for the domestic petroleum retail market and benefit customers because both Idemitsu Kosan and KPI are well-known enter-prises with numerous achievements in the petroleum retail business in Japan and Eu-rope.Speaking at the ceremony, IQ8 general director Hiroaki Honjo stated that the company set to establish the professional retail petroleum trading network in Vietnam.IQ 8 will operate in petroleum import, wholesale, and retail, mainly through the con-struction and management of service stations, across Vietnam. The products will come from the upcoming Nghi Son oil refinery and petrochemical complex in the central province of Thanh Hoa, in which Idemitsu and KPI both have stakes."The first station is considered the beginning for IQ8's operation in Vietnam as well as a foundation for its expansion to emerging markets in the Pacific Belt region," said Ghanim Al Otaibi, chair of IQ8 cum vice president of KPI in Asia.Pressure to improveIQ8's petroleum stations will apply an automatic management software, permitting card payments and numerous convenient functions for customers.Besides, stations will be equipped with the most modern safety technologies and facil-ities to maximally prevent leakages, thereby minimising environmental risks. Further-more, the staff will be trained to meet Japanese standards.IQ8's service stations will offer plenty of advantages to attract customers, while simul-taneously creating competition on the retail petroleum market that is currently domi-nated by domestic distributors."Foreign newcomers will create pressure on domestic petroleum distributors to up-grade their existing facilities and improve service quality. Petrolimex anticipated the competition created by foreign distributors and has started preparations ten years ago, thus we are ready to take on IQ8 and other competitors," said Nguyen Quang Dung, deputy general director of Petrolimex.However, Dung stated that in general, foreign investors financial potential is a strong advantage when they start operations in Vietnam, however, in the petroleum trading sector alone, this advantage is not as pronounced, as success also depends on market share, business site, as well as the operation network. Dung expressed confidence thanks to Petrolimex's existing advantages.


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Accordingly, with 50 years of experience in the petroleum trading sector, Petrolimex is the biggest petroleum distributor in Vietnam with an extensive distribution net-work. The petroleum giant currently holds almost 50 per cent of the petroleum retail market, with over 50 per cent of its products directly sold to consumers and around 20 per cent to industrial customers.The Vietnamese petroleum retail market is considered highly attractive by potential foreign investors. Petroleum sales volume at present is between 17-19 million tonnes per year, 65 per cent of which is imported.http://www.vir.com.vn/idemitsu-q8-officially-joins-vietnamese-petroleum-retail-sec-tor.html

Vietnamese vexed by Viettel's plan to charge iMessage activation fees

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| TUOITRE NEWS

Viettel subscribers have expressed their anger over the Vietnamese military-run mo-bile carrier's plan to charge users for activating iMessage and FaceTime on their Apple devices.iMessage and FaceTime are both services allowing iPhone, iPad and Macbook users to make phone calls and send text messages via the Internet free of charge. Users only need a 3G, 4G or WiFi connection to be able to use these iOS apps.However, on October 6, Viettel notified its subscribers via an SMS that an activation fee of VND2,500 would take effect from October 15.Upon receiving the notification, many local subscribers took it to mean that Viettel would now charge them VND2,500 for every iMessage or FaceTime call, thus resulting in outrage, despite the carrier stating clearly in its announcement that only an "activa-tion fee" would be charged.This means that whenever the FaceTime or iMessage apps are toggled 'on' in settings, the network carrier must send an international SMS to Apple's server in the UK to ac-tivate them.So far, Viettel has been covering this activation fee for its subscribers, but on October 15 the mobile carrier will start charging VND2,500 for each activation message only.The mobile carrier said the activation fee is applied only in a couple of cases, including when a subscriber uses iMessage or FaceTime with a new SIM card for the first time, or when they use either service after resetting their device.Users will not have to pay the fees whenever they turn their device on or off, or switch to Airplane Mode, according to Viettel.Viettel did note that iMessage and FaceTime are activated individually, meaning users must pay VND5,000 to have make both available for use.The carrier added that it had made the policy shift transparent by notifying subscribers ten days in advance of the new rule.The charges are also in line with industry standards according to Viettel, as similar services also require activation fees including miMessage on China's Xiaomi devices.http://tuoitrenews.vn/news/business/20171009/vietnamese-vexed-by-viettels-plan-to-charge-imessage-activation-fees/41959.html

EVN reports fewer power cuts in 2017


State-owned Electricity of Vietnam (EVN) Group has reported fewer blackouts in the first nine months of the year as part of improvements across power supplying indexes.According to the group, there was a 43 percent reduction in its System Average Inter-ruption Duration Index (SAIDI) in the first eight months of the year compared to the same period in 2016.SAIDI is the average outage duration for each customer served, measured in units of time, often minutes or hour. Specifically, the group's total SAIDI in the period was 624 minutes.The Momentary Average Interruption Frequency Index (MAIFI) was 0.64 times per cli-ent, down 36.2 percent, and the System Average Interruption Frequency Index (SAIFI) was 4.56 times per client, decreasing 36.2 percent year-on-year.Electricity supply is ensured as water levels in northern reservoirs are higher than ex-


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pectation.The group generated and purchased a total of 147.92 billion kWh of electricity in the past nine months, a year-on-year surge of 8.17 percent. It sold 129.6 billion kWh of elec-tricity during January-September, rising 9.07 percent from the same time last year.The rate of power loss over transmission was 7.26 percent, lower than the yearly target of 7.47 percent.In October, EVN plans to produce and import 49.8 billion kWh in total with commer-cial power output standing at 45 billion kWh.Along with ensuring sufficient supply for significant socio-economic events like the Apec Economic Leaders' Week 2017 and the 14th National Assembly's 4th session, the group will continue safe and stable operation of power system and keep close watch on weather conditions in order to make timely response to any unexpected situation. http://english.vov.vn/economy/evn-reports-fewer-power-cuts-in-2017-360021.vov

Vinasun taxis sloganise against Uber and Grab

10/OCT/2017 INTELLASIA| DTI NEWS

Leaders of Vinasun taxis in HCM City have pledged to remove all the decals with slo-gans opposing Uber and Grab services from their cars.Ta Long Hy, deputy general director of Vinasun said on Monday that the company held an urgent meeting the same day following criticism from the public on their de-cals."We'll remove all the decals on Tuesday," Hy said.Vinasun taxis with the slogan that "Uber and Grab have to conform to Vietnamese laws" or "Uber and Grab's pilot operation must be stopped in Vietnam" have been found on cars driving through HCM City streets since Sunday morning. The slogans written in yellow on red decals on the back of the taxis are very noticeable to people.Most Vinasun taxis running on HCM City streets have these slogans, but they have not been seen on taxis of other firms in HCM City.In an interview with local media earlier, Hy said that this was done by some drivers and claimed it had nothing to do with the management. He, however, added that he had no problem with the stickers and five taxi firms in Hanoi had earlier done the same way to urge management authorities to stop Uber and Grab operation in Vietnam.Meanwhile, a Vinsun taxi said that he and many other colleagues pasted the slogan on the taxi following the nod from the company's leaders.Dr Bui Quang Tin, CEO of BizLight Business School, said Vinasun drivers were acting a little bit childishly and suggested it was evidence of people grappling with the prob-lems of competition culture. No big companies in the world issued such campaigns.Tin added that enterprises are allowed to compete in line with the law. Competition obviously shouldn't infringe upon the legal rights of other companies or consumers.The Competition Law also bans negative advertising against other companies or pub-lish inaccurate information to affect them.Lawyer Nguyen Duc Chanh from Duc Chanh Ltd Co. said that Uber and Grab could file a case against the Vinasun defamation.Government Decree 71 set out fines from VND10 million (USD454.5) to VND100 mil-lion (USD4,540) for those found guilty of breaking this law.Deputy minister of Industry and Trade Do Thang Hai said that the ministry had in-structed the Competition Management Board to investigate to see whether Vinasun had violated the competition law or not.http://dtinews.vn/en/news/018/53206/vinasun-taxis-sloganise-against-uber-and-grab.html

VNA to move operations to T4 at Changi Airport


National carrier Vietnam Airlines (VNA) announced it will switch operations to Ter-minal T4 at Changi International Airport, Singapore, from November 7.At the terminal, Vietnam Airlines will deploy 10 check-in counters from one to 10. It will open more counters from number 11 to 14 in case of increasing demand for pas-senger services.


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The firm also applies the advanced technology of entry and exit and boarding at the terminal (parallel to the traditional form of these services) to speed up the time of mak-ing procedures and increasing convenience for passengers.Terminal T4 is a newly-built terminal, scheduled to open on October 31, 2017. It covers an area of more than 225,000sq.m and has capacity of 16 million visitors per year.Located on the second floor of the station, the firm's Business Class room with an area of more than 1,000sq.m will serve its Golden Lotus, Gold Platinum members and Busi-ness Class passengers.Other airlines will also operate at the T4 Terminal, including Cathay Pacific Airways, Korean Air, Cebu Pacific Air, Spring Airlines and AirAsia Group.http://bizhub.vn/corporate-news/vna-to-move-operations-to-t4-at-changi-airport_289389.html

Vietjet's hot air balloon lands in America


Vietjet's air balloon featuring its beautiful and young flight attendant participated in the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta 2017 in the US, the largest balloon festi-val in the world.Vietjet's balloon sports the colours of the Vietnamese national flag red and yellow and is 25m high and 18m wide. The balloon can cover a large distance and reach a maxi-mum height of nearly 1,000m, is showcased to visitors from October 7 to October 15.Festival visitors have the opportunity to watch the Vietjet balloon lift into the pano-ramic sky view of Albuquerque while meeting the airline's friendly models.Launched in 2016, Vietjet balloon has participated in a series of major festivals in Viet-nam and around the world. At the 2016 Hue Festival, the Vietjet balloon was the only representative of Vietnam to participate in the 2016 International Hot Air Balloon Fes-tival with balloons from eight other countries, including UK, Netherlands, India, Ja-pan, Korea, Thailand, Malaysia and the Philippines.In August the same year, the balloon made its first overseas appearance at Taiwan's largest hot air balloon festival, LuyeGaotai, in Taitung City. The company continues to be the only representative from Vietnam to participate in the ninth "My Balloon Fiesta" in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, with 18 participants from 11 different countries in March 2017. After the US, the Vietjet balloon will travel to its next destination in Japan in No-vember 2017.First held in 1972, the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta is an annual festival of hot air balloons that takes place every October in Albuquerque, New Mexico. This year's theme is inflate your imagination through countless colours and shapes, and endless possibilities of fun and exploration.The 46th fiesta, held in Albuquerque, New Mexico, from October 7 to October 15, at-tracted more than 550 balloons and nearly 1,000 pilots worldwide. This year's event also featured more than 94 unique balloon designs from 22 countries, including the US, Britain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Brazil, the Czech Republic and Japan.http://bizhub.vn/corporate-news/vietjets-hot-air-balloon-lands-in-america_289390.html

What lies behind Vietlott CEO's resignation


The abrupt resignation of Tong Quoc Truong, CEO of Vietnam Lottery Co., Ltd (Viet-lott) is rumoured to be related to the violations at PetroVietnam Finance Corporation (PVFC) that took place during his time in office as CEO at PVFC and are currently un-der investigation.According to newswire Dantri, Truong officially left the CEO position of Vietlott on October 1 due to personal reasons, which was accepted by the Ministry of Finance (MoF).MoF has assigned his deputy Nguyen Thanh Dam to hold the fort until a new CEO can be picked next week.Truong had been Vietlott's CEO since the company's foundation in August 2012.Before moving to the lottery firm, Truong was the general director of state-owned oil


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and gas group PetroVietnam's subsidiary PVFC between June 2007 and March 2010.PetroVietnam and its subsidiaries, including PVFC, have been under legal scrutiny for economic mismanagement by former executives that had resulted in enormous finan-cial losses.In a statement on September 29, the People's Court of Hanoi sentenced former Petro-Vietnam chair Nguyen Xuan Son to death for his misdeeds causing serious economic damage and abuse of power to misappropriate company assets.Regarding PVFC, in the 2006-2011 period, including the time that Truong was in office, PetroVietnam poured capital into PVFC and allowed it (at the time under Truong's lead) to conduct illegal investment activities, causing massive losses for the state budg-et.http://www.vir.com.vn/what-lies-behind-vietlott-ceos-resignation.html

Experience new technologies in the water industry at VIETWATER from 8 to 10 November 2017


Only a month to go, Vietnam's leading international water supply, sanitation, water resources and purification event VIETWATER 2017 will take place at SECC, Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam from 8 to 10 November this year.The exhibition welcomes more than 480 participating companies from 38 countries and regions to showcase their cutting-edge technologies, solutions, products and equipment in all subdivisions of the water industry.Eliane van Doorn, Business Development director (Asean Business), UBM Asia, the or-ganiser of VIETWATER said, "In the recent press conference organised at Ho Chi Minh, we have announced to launch the 9th edition of VIETWATER this year. We surely continue to build an international business platform for 14,000 participants to connect, exchange and share their industry expertise. The exhibition features 14 inter-national pavilions, allowing opportunities for participants to learn the latest technolo-gy updates in the water industry. In line with the orientation of sustainable water development, VIETWATER 2017 has carried out some activities to support not only businesses but also the general community".Onward with the orientation, the pre-show conference was held in Hanoi, targeting to improve the quality of Water Supply and Sanitation Service through Innovations, Up-graded Technologies and Effective Utility Management.Moving further, UBM is working in partnership with the Vietnam Water Supply and Sewerage Association (VWSA), Australian Water Association (AWA) and SkyJuice Foundation for a CSR project on 18 September, delivering a safe drinking water project in the rural communities of Khanh Phu and Lien Sang, Khanh Hoa Province, Vietnam.The project introduces advanced, low cost and easy to operate membrane filtration systems to two rural schools, providing 20,000 L per day of safe drinking water to the children and staff. The project involves training of local representatives from the Khanh Hoa Provincial Water Supply Authority and operators of the systems and is de-livered in partnership with the Khanh Hoa Peoples Committee to ensure the long-term sustainability of the treatment systems.Apart from these pre-show activities, VIETWATER 2017 is carrying a new movement with the Water Innovation Gallery opening a free space for the latest innovative tech-nologies and solutions and pushing the development of water technologies in Viet-nam. The gallery will take place along with the exhibition to welcome all participants for visiting, networking and finding their own solutions.The exhibition offers FREE admission, allowing all industry visitors opportunities to learn about Vietnam's water market, international technologies, and a number of prac-tical and insightful experiences from technical seminars and an international confer-ence with theme "Toward Sustainable Water Development International Experience".http://english.thesaigontimes.vn/56489/Experience-new-technologies-in-the-water-industry-at-VIETWATER-from-8-to-10-November-2017.html


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Vietnam Business Week to take place in early November


The Vietnam Business Summit will kick off in the central city of Da Nang on Novem-ber 7 within the framework of the Apec Economic Leaders' Week, heard a press con-ference in Hanoi on October 9.The conference, held by the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) and relevant parties, updated outcomes of the third meeting of the Apec Business Adviso-ry Council (ABAC 3) in Toronto, Canada, on July 24-28, as well as recommendations of Apec business leaders to be submitted to Apec ministers during the week.Hoang Van Dung, ABAC Chair, said that at the meeting, the council highly valued positive impacts of the global trade system which is developing on the basis of law and open market, helping improve living standards of people in the Apec member econo-mies.ABAC3 held that Apec not only gears towards a more open and integrated region but also aims to bring about sustainable, inclusive growth to the community, he said.The meeting heard that trade liberalisation has generated great social benefits, helping millions of people escape from poverty, Dung said, adding that trade liberalisation has been reflected through the formation and implementation of promising trade agree-ments like the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement, the Regional Comprehen-sive Economic Partnership (RCEP) agreement and the Pacific Alliance.Such deals have contributed to creating new jobs and ensuring food security in the re-gion, while promoting trade in the future and laying a foundation for the formation of a Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP), he noted.The council, therefore, underlined the need for Apec to take concrete steps to realise the target of the FTAAP.Dung said business leaders expressed their support for multilateral trade while agree-ing to continue the FTAAP, pursue the new agenda on services, remove non-tariff bar-riers, facilitate trade and investment, and put forth a post-2020 Vision for Apec.They also backed the Apec connectivity programme and suggested intensifying digital and internet connectivity, facilitating the movement of skilled workers, developing a contingent of quality labourers and enhancing the participation of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises in the global market via digital economy and e-commerce.Vu Tien Loc, VCCI Chair, such issues as innovative business model, the facilitation of small enterprises' access to finance and women's participation in economic activities, along with economic, financial and social inclusion, food security and energy, and green growth also won approval of businesses.

Canon Expo to open in HCM City


Canon Marketing Vietnam has announced that imaging products, solutions and tech-nologies will be showcased at its biggest show, Canon Expo 2017, in HCM City from October 26-28.Many of them, including EOS sensors of up to 120 MP and 250 MP resolution, 3D prod-uct printers and 4K colour monitors will be showcased for the first time in Vietnam.Visitors will be free to explore the Canon world, with discounts of up to 49 percent on offer for products on display. In addition, they will have the opportunity to have Can-on cameras and lenses checked free of charge and attend workshops with professional photographers.In addition to Canon Expo, the 12th Canon PhotoMarathon will be back.With a record total prize pool of VND1.4 billion (US$61,700) the contest annually at-tracts close to 10,000 participants.Besides prizes such as cameras and printers, this year the winner will receive sponsor-ship to compete at the Canon PhotoMarathon Asia Championship 2018 with 16 com-petitors from around the region, vying to win more prizes worth up to $5,000.The expo and the photo contest will be held at Hoa Lu Stadium in District 1 in HCM City.http://english.vov.vn/economy/canon-expo-to-open-in-ho-chi-minh-city-360024.vov End


finance & business news 10 October 2017...10 October 2017 Intellasia No. 21, lane 173/63/17, Ngoc Ha...

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Transcript of finance & business news 10 October 2017...10 October 2017 Intellasia No. 21, lane 173/63/17, Ngoc Ha...