Billionaire Nguyen Dang Quang

Just in the last several months of 2020, MSN shares of Nguyen Dang Quang’s Masan Group saw prices increase by twofold, hitting VND95,000 per share in mid-November. The prices continued increasing in early 2021, reaching VND100,000 per share in late January.

The price increase helped Quang have hundreds of millions of dollars worth of stock assets, while Masan’s shareholders also got $2 billion.

This was a surprise to many people, because Masan, like other businesses, suffered from the Covid-19 pandemic.

The consumer goods retail integration strategy has begun bearing fruit with VinCommerce making profit in Q4. Meanwhile, Masan Consumer Holdings (MCH) reported a 30 percent revenue growth rate, for the first time obtaining revenue of $1 billion.

Masan Group’s revenue increased sharply, doubling last year, hitting VND77.2 trillion, while the net profit was VND1.234 trillion.

Vingroup (VIC) of the dollar billionaire Pham Nhat Vuong has reported revenue of VND110 trillion, or $5 billion for the stormy year 2020, which marked a milestone in its strategy on shifting focus to technology, industry and service.

The revenue from automobile and smartphone manufacturing increased sharply in the year, while revenue from the real estate sector kept rising thanks to three Vinhomes huge projects. The revenue of VinSmart/VinFast increased by twofold to VND18 trillion.

Analysts say that Vuong gained initial success in the industry sector as his VinFast sold 31,500 cars in 2020 alone. Of these, VinFast Fadil, VinFast Lux A and VinFast Lux SA became the bestsellers in their market segments.

Meanwhile, his VinSmart stayed firmly among the bestselling smartphone models in Q4. It began providing smarthome solutions in two mega urban areas – Vinhomes Ocean Park and Vinhomes Smart City in Hanoi.

Hoa Phat Group of billionaire Tran Dinh Long has reported a post-tax profit of VND13.5 trillion in 2020, a sharp increase of 80 percent over the year before.

Hoa Phat is described as an enterprise that ‘swam against the current’. Most other steel manufacturers faced difficulties in 2020 because of the sharp rise in input material prices, especially iron ore.

Meanwhile, Hoa Phat still reported revenue of VND91.3 trillion, up by 41 percent over 2019. The group’s market share surged to 32.5 percent.

Vinamilk also gained impressive business results in 2020 with revenue of VND59.6 trillion thanks to the robust growth of enterprises after M&A and the good news about dairy exports to South Korea, China, Africa, Singapore and Southeast Asian countries.

Preparing for breakthrough

Last year was a stormy one for Vietnam’s businesses, but billionaires still were able to pocket billions of dollars.

Large corporations have also engaged in activities to make a breakthrough when the pandemic is over.

Quang of Masan said in 2021, the group aims to develop VCM into a platform serving essential needs - Point of Life, providing essential goods and services accounting for over 50 percent of consumer spending, including FMCG, fresh food, financial services and added value services.

Masan got big money from pork in 2020 as the pork price stayed high and the selling prices of its MeatDeli products were always higher than the market prices thanks to the increase in demand for high-quality meat.

In the case of Hoa Phat, its steel manufacturing sector was consolidated after its Dung Quat mill became operational. The enterprise also strengthened investment in agriculture and industrial real estate.

Hoa Phat gained impressive growth in agriculture projects. It is now holding 50 percent of Australian beef market share, producing 700,000 chicken eggs a day and is among the top enterprises in pig farming with the herd of 400,000 pigs.

President Tran Dinh Long said Hoa Phat plans to deploy the second phase of Dung Quat Steel Complex in January 2022, expected to complete after three years.

The project, with the capacity of 5 million tons a year, is being developed to satisfy the demand for HRC and is expected to help increase the revenue and profit by 80 percent.

As for Vingroup, automobile manufacturing is a priority sector for now. VinFast has announced a plan to launch three electric car models and break even in the next five years thanks to their output increase to expand market share and production cost cutting.

VinFast has also kicked off an electric bus project, VinBus, striving to obtain 30 percent of the market share in Vietnam.

Vietjet Air, owned by the female dollar billionaire Nguyen Phuong Thao, was one of only a few airlines in the world which did not lay off workers in 2020 and still made a profit.

Its finance report showed revenue from supporting services accounting for nearly 50 percent, which means that it strengthened supporting services to offset decreases in revenue from air tickets.

Phan Van Nhan from Sai Gon Securities pointed out that large groups are resilient and can adapt quickly. 

V. Ha

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