The world is seeing increasing investment in e-commerce and other digital economy sectors, but there are few listed companies in these areas in Vietnam, and foreign investors are unhappy about this, Dominic Scriven, its chairman, said.

The Vietnamese market remains small with few quality shares, and all good companies have seen their foreign ownership caps nearly reached, he told VnExpress.

In the first four months of this year foreign investors' net selling on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange has topped VND12.76 trillion ($553 million), nearly the same as the whole of last year (VND13.33 trillion).

Scriven said when the market situation is unfavorable, for instance amid the Covid-19 pandemic, foreign investors' first reaction is to withdraw.

The strengthening of the U.S. dollar is also causing concern among them about investing in developing markets, and they are switching on developed ones, he said.

However, with foreign investors accounting for only around 5 percent of total holdings, the market seems unaffected, he said.

The VN-Index is being supported by new investors, a trend that has been seen in other markets such as South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand when incomes reach a certain level, he added.