ANZ: Vietnam's GDP growth reached 6.8% in 2015

ANZ Bank in its 2015 Global Economic Information Update report, when talking about Vietnam's economy, was quite optimistic, saying that Vietnam's economy is a rare light in the gloomy picture of most emerging economies.

"Vietnam's GDP growth after 3 quarters has reached 6.5%, higher than expected. This makes us once again raise Vietnam's GDP growth forecast to 6.8% for this year and 6.9% for 2016 (previous forecasts were 6.5% and 6.5%, respectively)", Mr. Glenn Maguire, chief economist, South Asia, Southeast Asia and Pacific region of the Bank ANZ said.

Even quite optimistic, he also predicted that in 2017, Vietnam's GDP growth will be at 7%, maybe higher - up to 7%, and that will be 1 percentage point higher than China's GDP growth rate, the economy is slowing down after a period of hot growth.

"Domestic demand is still increasing, even though the Vietnamese Dong has depreciated by 5% since the beginning of the year. Export growth continues to achieve encouraging results in the context of declining regional trade," Mr. Glenn Maguire said.

Regarding this issue, ANZ's report said that China's economic growth is slowing down, as well as the decrease in oil prices, which has had a significant impact on the global and regional economy. There was even a “trade recession” happening in this area.

The good news is that, according to Mr. Glenn Maguire, it is unlikely that the trade recession will turn into a widespread recession for ASEAN countries, although this is still something to be warned about.

In that gloomy context, Vietnam continues to be a bright spot, with high export growth, because it knows how to diversify its export goods portfolio, creating resilience for the economy to withstand the global recession.

"Vietnam, India and the Philippines, which we refer to as VIP, will be the three economies least affected by adverse developments in the global economy", ANZ commented and said that Vietnam can be completely proud of its achievements, from good import and export growth, to maintaining the value of its currency...

“We believe in the prospects of Vietnam's economy,” Mr. Glenn Maguire said and happily emphasized that Vietnamese consumer confidence has improved.

"Looking at car sales in recent times has shown an improving trend of the economy. This is an important indicator showing the health of the economy, because for Vietnamese people, homes and cars are the two most important assets. When the speed of car sales increases strongly, it means that consumer confidence has increased sharply," said Mr. Glenn Maguire.

In the first eight months of the year, Vietnam's car sales were 124,069 units, compared to only 76,041 in the same period in 2014.

Meanwhile, regarding the question of Vietnam's public debt, Mr. Glenn Maguire said that Vietnam's public debt figure is not really worrying compared to some countries in the region. "To reduce public debt, we must cut regular expenditures and at the same time promote economic growth. When GDP increases, the public debt/GDP ratio will decrease," said Mr. Glenn Maguire.