"Vietnam has been a big beneficiary of global trade — Trump’s new tariffs threaten to derail that", 8 April 2025

Vietnam has long been viewed as a successful example of embracing external trade, luring some of the largest companies in the world to establish hubs to manufacture everything from footwear to electronic products that grace shops around the world.

But now, concerns are mounting that U.S. President Donald Trump’s aggressive tariffs could derail Vietnam’s ambitious growth target despite diplomatic overtures to Washington that economists say are unlikely to shift policy soon.

Trump hit the Southeast Asian nation with a 46% import duty, one of the steepest among the over 180 countries targeted, dealing a heavy blow to a nation that derived nearly 90% of its annual gross domestic product from exports of goods and services in 2023, according to estimates from the World Bank.

The new levies could shave 1.2 percentage point off Vietnam’s economic growth this year, …

Vietnam has emerged as a manufacturing hub for many companies that sell goods in the U.S., including multinational consumer goods retailers such as Nike, Adidas, Uniqlo and Apple Inc, because of a blend of relatively cheap labor costs and supportive government policies…

Nguyen Thu Oanh, head of the inflation department at the statistics office, said … the new U.S. tariffs could lead some foreign companies to move part of their production out of Vietnam, Bloomberg reported…

Aside from China, Vietnam will face a more challenging path to reach a deal with Washington than others in Asia, said Chetan Ahya, chief Asia economist at Morgan Stanley, thanks in part to its large trade surplus with the U.S. and its role in facilitating the rerouting of Chinese companies’ supply chains…