The Effect of Trade Openness on Foreign Direct Investment in Vietnam

The purpose of this paper is to study the impact of trade openness on foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows into Vietnam, an emerging country with relatively high trade openness in recent years. The study used the vector autoregression (VAR) model to examine the impact of trade openness on FDI in Vietnam, in the period from 2005 to 2019. The research data are time-series data, with quarterly frequency, from 2005:Q4 to 2019:Q3. The FDI data were collected by International Financial Statistics. The data of trade openness were calculated based on Vietnam's export, import, and GDP data collected by the General Statistics Office of Vietnam. The estimated result shows that the trade openness has a positive effect on FDI. The current FDI is heavily influenced by FDI in the past with an average explanation of 74%. The main findings indicate that trade openness has a positive effect on FDI inflows into Vietnam. The findings also show that FDI in Vietnam is significantly affected by the shocks of the FDI itself in the past. The findings of the study suggest the Vietnamese Government improves the quality of trade openness and FDI, continues and maintains economic relations with other countries to increase trade openness.