Hanoi (VNA) - Nearly 80% of manufacturing and processing enterprises anticipate business conditions in the third quarter to be stable or improve, according to the National Statistics Office (NSO).
Findings from a recent business sentiment survey conducted by the NSO under the Ministry of Finance show that 37.3% of businesses expect better performance in Q3, while 43.5% forecast steady operations. About 19.2% believe difficulties will persist.
Foreign-invested enterprises (FDI) remain the most optimistic, with 81% predicting stable or improved conditions. The proportion stands at 79.8% for state-owned enterprises and 80.7% for private domestic firms.
In Ho Chi Minh City, the country’s economic powerhouse, a similar survey by the municipal Statistics Office reveals that 41.8% of businesses foresee stable production and operations in Q3, while 33.7% expect improvement.
By ownership type, 85.7% of state-owned enterprises in HCM City forecast more favourable conditions this quarter compared to Q2. This rate is 74.5% for FDI firms and 68.9% for non-state enterprises.
Regarding second-quarter performance, nearly 36% of surveyed businesses nationwide said conditions had improved from the first quarter. Meanwhile, 43% reported stable operations and 21.3% faced ongoing challenges. In HCM City, almost 75% of enterprises recorded either steady or improved activity.
According to the NSO, industrial production continued to show strong growth in the previous quarter. The Industrial Production Index (IIP) is estimated to have risen 10.3% year-on-year in Q2, with manufacturing and processing up 12.3%. Over the first half of 2025, the IIP grew by an estimated 9.2%, the highest first-half increase since 2020.
The sector's added value expanded by 8.07% in the first six months, marking the second-highest rate in the 2020–2025 period, trailing only the 8.89% recorded in the same period of 2022. This contributed 2.64 percentage points to the overall GDP growth. Accordingly, Vietnam’s GDP in H1 surged by 7.52%, the highest rate for the same period since 2011.
Meanwhile, Vietnam’s manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) for June, released by S&P Global, came in at 48.9, staying below the 50-point threshold for the third consecutive month, signaling a contraction.
Andrew Harker, economics director for Economic Indicators & Surveys at S&P Global Market Intelligence, attributed the decline to subdued global demand for Vietnamese manufactured goods. Nonetheless, he noted production output increasing for the second straight month, and gradually improving business confidence as a positive trend./.
