The latest updates from the Foreign Investment Agency revealed that Vietnam invested 3.97 million USD abroad in January, more than three times higher than the same month last year.

Cambodian telecom firm Metfone, a subsidiary of Vietnam's mobile carrier Viettel Group.
Telecommunications was among leading sectors for Vietnam's overseas investment.
(Photo: phnompenhpost.com)

Seven new projects were granted investment licences, with total registered capital of 3.83 million USD and one raised its capital by nearly 140,000 USD.

Vietnam’s overseas investment in January mainly poured into retail and wholesale (accounting for 71.8 percent of the total registered capital), construction (3.4 percent), manufacturing and processing (3.7 percent), and telecommunications (3.4 percent).

Four countries received investment from Vietnam in January. Among them, the US was the leading destination with total investment of more than 3.53 million USD, followed by Japan with an investment worth 182,400 USD, Cambodia with 150,000 USD and Republic of Korea with 100,000 USD.

In 2019, Vietnam invested a total of more than 508 million USD in 32 countries and territories, of which 403 million USD was poured into 164 new projects and 29 projects increased their capitals by a total of nearly 105 million USD.

The retail and wholesale industry was the leading sector for Vietnamese overseas investment with 121.6 million USD in 2019.

Other attractive sectors were agro-forestry-fishery and science and technology.

Australia was the top destination for Vietnam’s overseas investment last year, followed by the US and Cambodia.

Since 1989, Vietnam had so far invested more than 22 billion USD abroad, mainly in agro-forestry-fishery, energy and telecommunications sectors.