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Headlines:
150 Days to Fix What FDI Built
Hanoi Goes Nuclear (Again), With Putin's Blessing
Brussels Opens the Checkbook, Shuts Out Chinese 5G
Crypto Gets Its Papers After a Decade in Limbo
VietinBank Jolts the Dollar Market as Spread Hits 6%
Lights Out in Dak Lak
Fuel Shock Clips Wings on 23 Weekly Flights
Durian Dollars Roll In While Rice Farmers Sweat
Big Banks Join the VIFC Queue
Hanoi Takes Its Pitch to the Trading Floor
Gold Shrugs Off Gravity
150 Days to Fix What FDI Built
Observers in Ho Chi Minh City are telling exporters that the 150-day US tariff pause ending in July shouldn’t be taken as breathing room, and the end date needs to be treated as a restructuring deadline. Foreign companies make up more than three-quarters of exports and together they posted a $49.5 billion trade surplus with Washington; in contrast, domestic exporters shrank 6.1% and ran a deficit. Low-margin sectors like garments and seafood are going to get the tightest squeeze from the uniform 10% tariff, especially if buyers aren’t willing to absorb the hit. Th risk isn't isn’t just the rate itself but what comes after, namely origin fraud crackdowns that could crater the "Made in Vietnam" label if third-country (*no names mentioned*) goods keep going through local ports to dodge levies.
Read more: Vietnam Investment Review
Hanoi Goes Nuclear (Again), With Putin's Blessing
PM Pham Minh Chinh signed a nuclear power plant deal with Russia in Moscow, bringing atomic energy plans back to life. Vietnam previously scrapped their ambitions in 2016 after Fukushima spooked investors and costs ballooned. The deal, formalized during talks with Russian PM Mikhail Mishustin and witnessed by Rosatom chief Aleksey Likhachev, focuses on what's understood to be the Ninh Thuan 1 project. The resurrection comes as the country needs stable, low-carbon baseload power to keep the fires of industrial growth burning. Bilateral trade with Russia was $4.77 billion in 2025, though Russia is just 26th on the foreign investor leaderboard with just under a billion USD in 199 projects.
Read more: The Moscow Times (Sistema expansion), Vietnam Insiders (Ninh Thuan revival), VnExpress (metro, tourism), VnEconomy ($4.77B trade figure)
Brussels Opens the Checkbook, Shuts Out Chinese 5G
The EU showed up in Hanoi on March 24 with €560 million for transport and clean energy as well as a less-than-subtle message about whose kit should be running the country's telecoms networks. Commissioner Jozef Sikela introduced the package at the EU-Vietnam Global Gateway Business and Investment Forum. The headline piece of the deal is a €40 million transport lending facility for infrastructure projects like the Hanoi-Ho Chi Minh City high-speed rail, which is also expected to take in more than €1 billion in concessional loans from European development banks. Those same banks have already signed €230 million in loans for Electricity Vietnam's Bac Ai project, and the European Investment Bank has a €200 million agreement with Techcombank to build out renewable energy and electric mobility for SMEs. The sweetener came with a catch, however, as Sikela publicly asked Hanoi to steer clear of Chinese 5G technology.
Read more: VnEconomy (loan breakdowns), VnEconomy (forestry grant), Table Media (5G warning)
Crypto Gets Its Papers After a Decade in Limbo
Hanoi (finally) has its five-year pilot program to regulate crypto assets properly underway, ending ten years of debate over whether digital currencies are “property,” and who should police them. The Ministry of Finance is tipped to lead oversight, and the State Securities Commission is already accepting registrations from service providers. In getting this moving, the government settled three big questions: 1) Crypto qualifies as an asset because it results from labor and has measurable value. 2) The Civil Code doesn't need rewriting. And 3) Finance takes the wheel because crypto mobilizes capital. Three circulars are in the works to address the fine details of accounting standards, auditing rules, and tax policy for crypto businesses. Service providers can register now; if the pilot delivers, a standalone crypto law is expected to follow.
Read more: VnEconomy
VietinBank Jolts Dollar Market as Spread Hits 6%
VietinBank jolted the forex market on Sunday with a VND42 jump, roughly 0.16%, in its dollar purchase price, eight times the VND5 nudge from Vietcombank, Agribank, and most other banks. The interbank rate rose to VND26,340, almost touching the regulatory ceiling of VND26,344, as the State Bank's central rate crept up VND5 to VND25,090. Free-market dollars now trade at VND27,950-28,000, a gap of roughly VND1,650 over bank counters, which is a noteworthy 6%. The spread has widened roughly 4.5% since the start of this calendar year. Commercial banks are tightening the spread to compete for greenbacks; Techcombank and ACB are down to VND180-185 and LPBank is above VND250, which suggests uneven liquidity across the system.
Read more: VnEconomy
Lights Out in Dak Lak
Security forces sent more than 150 operators into three communes in Dak Lak Province on Sunday, where they nabbed six independent Protestant preachers in pre-dawn raids. Authorities cut power to neighborhoods in Ea Khit Village before 70ish officers surrounded the homes of Y Wen Nie and Y Bay Eban around 6:00 AM. Separate units rolled into Cue Village at 5:00 AM and Puor Village at 5:30 AM. Family members who tried to film the arrests were allegedly assaulted by officers, who reportedly confiscated several phones and destroyed at least one.
Read more: Genocide Watch
Fuel Shock Clips Wings on 23 Weekly Flights
Vietnam Airlines is cutting 23 flights a week starting in April, axing routes including Hai Phong to Buon Ma Thuot and Ho Chi Minh City to Van Don as Jet A-1 prices hit $230 / barrel in Asian trading. That's about double what Brent crude is trading for, as the jet fuel crack spread has opened up. The carrier is getting fuel surcharges ready to slap on to international routes - expect those to kick in by early April. Global airlines have raised fares between 5 and 20% already, and cargo operators are tacking on surcharges of between VND17,000-40,000 for every kilo sent aloft.
Read more: Vietnam News (CAAV survey data), Vietnam Insiders (route details)
Durian Dollars Roll In, Rice Farmers Sweat
Durian shipment invoices to China are at a respectable $300 million YTD, stunningly at a pace of 469% above last year’s. Lobster exports to China are also seeing a robust kick-off to the year, deliveries of that product are up 65%. The off-season timing helps because the durian harvest lands when other products are mostly out of season, putting fruit on Chinese shelves right around Tet when demand peaks. The agriculture ministry is eager to grow that market, but rice is a very different story. Paddy prices are down from last year just as farmers are coming into peak harvest for the winter-spring crop, so the job of figuring out how to move more product will surely be high on the agenda at the rice export conference running in Can Tho this week.
Read more: VnExpress (orchard prices), VnEconomy (rice conference)
Big Banks Join the VIFC Queue
State-owned VietinBank and Vietcombank are joining private lenders in setting up subsidiaries at the International Financial Centre in Ho Chi Minh City. VietinBank is looking options for a subsidiary or other legal entity at the hub, with plans to expand into fintech and digital assets, including partnerships with startups in the orbit of (Japanese) shareholder MUFG to develop payment, lending, and insurance services. The bank is also trying to position itself up as a payment intermediary for digital asset transactions once regulations permit it. Vietcombank is expected to ask shareholders to approve its own VIFC subsidiary, with an eye toward cross-border finance, investment banking, and digital asset services.
Read more: Vietnam News
Hanoi Takes Its Pitch to the Trading Floor
Deputy PM Nguyen Hoa Binh sat down with Nasdaq and NYSE executives in New York on Sunday, pushing the country's international financial center plan to the exchanges that (between them) hold more than 40% of the global market cap. Nasdaq's Jeff Thomas highlighted his exchange's AI and blockchain chops; NYSE's Chris Taylor touted his 2,400 listed companies from 48 countries. Binh asked both for help on developing listing standards, technology transfers, and governance training. Nasdaq said it would support firms that wanted to access US capital markets and NYSE said Vietnams financial center plans are an important step to wider market development. No company from Vietnam has yet listed on a US exchange.
Read more: Vietnam News
Gold Shrugs Off Gravity
Gold rose back to VND176.1 million per tael, up from about VND160 million from early January. Local prices are up almost 10% this year, even as international prices have dropped more than 18% since the Feb. 28 US-Israeli strike on Iran. Dollar strength and fading Fed rate-cut hopes keep dragging global prices down, but local buyers, hedging against the dong's dogged flaccidity, don’t seem to be getting the memo.
Read more: VnExpress (18% global drop), VnExpress ($4,800 recovery prediction)
That's all for this week, thanks for reading. Your voice matters to us. Feel we're missing something? Have additional sources to suggest? Don't hold back- hit reply and tell us what you think.
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