Vietnam is expected to get back to its pre-crisis gross domestic product (GDP) growth level of about 8% for the coming years, driven by both domestic and global demands, said Vietnam Asset Management (VAM) chief executive officer Nguyen Xuan Minh.

   “Local demand has been very strong, even during the financial crisis. This is because of the young population and because of the global economic recovery, which helps the export market,” he said, pointing out that more than 50% of the Vietnamese population is below the age of 30. “Those people may start to have a family and start to buy apartments,” he said at the “Invest in Vietnam” campaign launched by HLG Unit Trust Bhd (HLG UT) and VAM here yesterday. VAM is the external foreign investment manager for the HLG Vietnam Fund investments in the Vietnamese equity market.

    Consumer-related products such as properties and mobile phones had registered strong sales, he noted, with mobile phone subscribers growing by 50% a year. Other key strengths include a highly educated population with a low labour cost. “We have a very young population with high literacy rate, yet labour cost is very low at about half of the cost of China. That’s why foreign investors start to see (Vietnam) as a low-cost place for their manufacturing facilities,” he said.

   While exports in Vietnam had declined by more than 10% this year, imports had also shrunk “quite significantly” by 25%, which aids the economy by improving the trade deficit, said Nguyen, a former senior vice-president of Franklin Templeton Investments.

   The HLG Vietnam fund, a wholesale fund that invests a minimum of 70% of its NAV in equities and equity-related securities of companies, was the best-performing equity fund for September, according to Lipper Research Series’ FundMarket Insight Report for Malaysia Market. The only fund within the Equity Emerging Markets Far East category, it registered a 12.73% gain for the month, a 29.77% gain for the past year ending Sept 30, and a 78% growth since it was launched in February 2008. The fund volatility stood at an annual standard deviation of 43.32, the third highest among the top 10 equity funds. As at Sept 30, 2009, the fund’s top three stock holdings are Pha Lai Thermal Power Joint Stock Company, Tien Phong Plastics Joint Stock Company and Hung Vuong Seafood Corporation.

    Via its “Invest In Vietnam” campaign for the HLG Vietnam Fund, HLG UT expects to rake in RM50 million in sales by end of this year. (The Edge Malaysia)