Preliminary assessment of Vietnam international merchandise trade performance in the first 4 months of 2019

2. In the first 4 months of 2019, Vietnam‘s trade-in-goods totaled US dollars 157.72 billion in value terms, 8.7% above the corresponding period of last year. As compared to result of a year earlier, total merchandise exports value rose 6.5%, to US dollars 79.24 billion and the total merchandise imports value increased 10.9% to US dollars 78.48 billion. Accordingly, Vietnam’s trade balance in this period was in the surplus of US dollars 752 million.

3. Trade data disseminated recently by Vietnam Customs announced that the total value of exportation and importation by foreign direct invested (FDI) traders reached USD 99.99 billion in total from beginning to April 2019, up by 5.6% as compared to the result of corresponding period of 2018. Total value of FDI exportation was USD 54.92 billion, went up by 4.3%. On import side, the total value of those companies was USD 45.07 billion, went up by 7.2%.

Main Exports and Imports

4. On a month-on-month basis, a decrease in total merchandise exports was due to the downturns in telephones, mobile phones and parts thereof (down by USD 1.50 billion); computers, electrical products and parts thereof ( down by USD 250 million); textiles and garments (down by USD 191 million); …

5. On a year-on-year basis, exports expanded USD 4.82 billion. The main products, which contributed to the increase, were computers, electrical products and parts thereof (up by USD 1.03 billion); textiles and garments (up by USD 874 million); foot-wears (up by USD 682 million); …

6. On a month-on-month basis, a reduction in total merchandise imports was due to the downturns of the commodities as follows: computers, electrical products, spare-parts and components thereof (down by USD 429 million); cashew nut (down by USD 78 million); plastics (down by USD 72 million);

7. On a year-on-year basis, imports went up USD 4.23 billion. The growth in imports was mainly contributed by the upturns of the following products: computers, electrical products, spare-parts and components thereof (up by USD 2.44 billion); machine, equipment, tools and instruments (up by USD 1.71 billion); crude oil (up by USD 1.23 billion); …

Trading Partners

8. In the first 4 months of 2019, Vietnamese merchandise trade with trading partners in Asia was totaled USD 103.94 billion in value terms, which moved up 7.2% as compared to the same period of 2018. Trade-in-goods of Vietnam with America was followed, which reached USD 28.23 billion and increased by 21.2%. The values of other continents were Europe: USD 20.68 billion, up by 2.9%; Oceania: USD 3.0 billion, up by 8.7% and Africa: USD 1.87 billion, down by 8.0% in comparison with the same period of last year.

9. For January-April period of 2019, 4 importing markets of Vietnam with turnover of over USD 6 billion were: The United States of America (reached USD 17.9 billion); China (reached USD 10.5 billion); Republic of Korea (reached USD 6.2 billion); Japan (reached USD 6.1 billion).

10. According to the following chart, top 3 big sources of Vietnam’s imports were as follows: China (reached USD 22.8 billion); Republic of Korea (reached USD 15.1 billion); Japan (reached USD 5.8 billion).