Vietnam was Plus One, now it’s a question mark

This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a bouquet of Bloomberg Opinion’s opinions. Sign up here. China joins the college protests. Plight of the to [Bloomberg]( This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a bouquet of Bloomberg Opinion’s opinions. [Sign up here](. Today’s Must-Reads - China joins the [college protests](. - Plight of the [tongue-tied]( polyglot. - It’s twilight for [Rishi Sunak](. - Japan, South Korea and Taiwan need to [get their act together](. Teeth and Lips and Tooth and Claw. Communist Vietnam’s founding father Ho Chi Minh famously compared his country’s relationship to its enormous northern neighbor China as “close as lips and teeth.” But a brief but fierce border war in 1979 and territorial counter-claims in the South China sea would estrange Hanoi and Beijing. No longer kissin’ kin, Vietnam then consorted with its other old enemy, the US, which was keen on containing China. Indeed, Vietnam would exploit the “China Plus One” policy of many countries, through which they’d diversify their supply chain dependence on Chinese manufacturing by finding alternatives in other industrious and politically stable developing nations. When investors spoke of the Plus One nations, which include India and Turkey, Vietnam was almost always the wunderkind —  super-efficient, cheap and, with the Communist party firmly in command, politically sturdy. A big plus for countries trying to minus themselves from China. However, the political part of the Vietnam argument has been under siege for months and was slammed again at the end of April with the resignation of Vuong Dinh Hue, chairman of the country’s parliament. That followed the dismissal of Vietnam’s president, Vo Van Thuong, in March. It’s all part of a purge initiated by Vietnam’s supreme leader, Communist Party chief Nguyen Phu Trong, purportedly aimed at ridding the country of corrupt officials. The results, however, have been destabilizing because, for one thing, Trong — 80-years old and rumored to be in ill health — has rid himself of all potential successors. He is expected to step down in January 2026, which isn’t much time to entrench an heir. Shuli Ren [wrote](in a column earlier in the week: “There are now concerns among investors that Vietnam, perfectly positioned to gain from the US-China rivalry, is not all that politically stable. With Hanoi’s power vacuum getting bigger, it’s unclear who will have the top job.”  Furthermore, instead of becoming distinct from China as a manufacturing source, the northern corner of Vietnam around the capital Hanoi  is increasingly a “de facto” province of Beijing, according to Shuli. It’s right next to the Chinese border, integrating itself into the bigger nation’s energy infrastructure as well as the roads that lead to China’s ports and cities. Meanwhile, foreign investor interest in China — which had waned over the last two years — is warming up, if the stock market in Hong Kong is any indication, as Shuli says in [her second column]( this week. In a [third column](this week (Shuli is prolific), she says investors are also excited over the possibility that China may finally be getting a grip on its ginormous property miasma. She says the jury is still out on whether this all augurs a comeback for the People’s Republic as an investment magnet. But, she writes, there is enough FOMO out there that “the China trade is back on.” That may also be true for Vietnam’s lips-and-teeth relationship with China. The Customer Is Always Wrong Matthew Brooker’s [latest column]( resonates with me. We’re both relatively recent transplants to London. He came back to his native Britain two years ago after decades in Hong Kong. I moved from New York in 2018. We’ve both discovered that UK companies have little regard for the customers who are their source of revenue. This is borne out by a survey he cites from the London-based Institute of Customer Service which said that its poll of 15,000 consumers showed its satisfaction index was at its lowest since 2015. Writes Matthew: “ I abandoned an attempt to open a UK account with HSBC Holdings Plc after being unable to prove my address. Try doing anything as a new arrival in Britain without a utility bill, a magical document that can open more doors than a passport. Having been an HSBC customer for 30 years in Asia didn’t count; neither did the letter that the utility company provided in place of a bill. ‘We can’t accept that,’ the branch employee said, before it was more than a quarter way out of the envelope.” I’ve had much better experience with HSBC. But, when I first tried to find a London flat, the realtor demanded that I provide a similar document to prove my previous address — and it had to be original, not a download from a website, not a photocopy or pdf or anything electronic. After much trouble and much (express mail) expense, a relative in New York found a suitable electricity bill to prove my previous address. The realty agent took a look at it, walked over to the corner of his office, made a xerox copy of it and handed the original back to me. I’m still livid. Telltale Charts “In a world where a coming flood of cheap Chinese clean technology is being treated as an existential threat justifying tariffs, investigations, and bans, Hungary is competing on cost. If you want to be able to buy a $10,000 electric car like BYD’s Seagull outside of China, that’s going to be essential… Some 40% of what you’re paying for when buying an electric vehicle is the battery pack. If European and US carmakers want to be able to compete with Chinese rivals on price as well as trade restrictions, they’re going to have to learn from what Hungary has done to make its power cells so cheap.” David Fickling in “[Hungary and China Are Fellow Travelers in a $10,000 Electric Car](.” “After despairing about the cost of my summer vacation, I was recently celebrating finding seemingly reasonably priced fares to Croatia. My moment was cut short by the catch: a checked 23-kilogram (51-pound) bag on the EasyJet Plc flight would cost almost 60 euros ($64.50) per passenger per flight. It was an unpleasant introduction to the wonders of dynamic pricing of ancillaries — industry jargon for varying costs for extras like bags and assigned seats depending on the route, flight and the time of the booking.” Chris Bryant in “[Summer Travelers Should Pack Light or Pay the Cost](.” Further Reading A Socialist formula for [Formula One](. — Chris Bryant What will [Nintendo](switch to next? — Gearoid Reidy NATO’s [Baltic](lake. — James Stavridis There’s [no such thing]( as a free AI? — Parmy Olson Macy versus the [barbarians at the gate](. — Andrea Felsted The [South Korean boom]( nobody noticed. — Daniel Moss Walk of the Town: Hong Kong Edition I’m working this week out of Hong Kong, which I haven’t visited since Margaret Thatcher was UK Prime Minister and the city was still British territory. The city isn’t as old as London, but both London and Hong Kong share World War II scars. The assault on London came from Hitler’s Luftwaffe and you can still see the ruins of churches as well as gouge-outs on some walls in the British capital. In Hong Kong, the Japanese invaders came by land, first sweeping into the Kowloon side before sending a four-prong attack across to the island. I took a five-mile walk out from the Central District to see the waterway, now glittering with high rise apartments. Looking across to where the invaders came in December 1941. Photograph by Howard Chua-Eoan/Bloomberg The wounds of war are more evident on two of Hong Kong’s more famous street residents: Stitt and Stephen, the bronze lions on the ground level of HSBC’s headquarters, which is just across the street from the Bloomberg offices here. The cats were named after managers at the bank at the time they were cast in the 1930s. Stitt to the West. Photograph by Howard Chua-Eoan/Bloomberg Stitt has a few notches but you can see the bullet and shrapnel marks on the torso and hindquarters of Stephen. Both lions could have vanished forever: They were taken from Hong Kong to Japan. After Tokyo’s surrender, a US sailor spotted them in an Osaka dockyard and knew to make HSBC aware that their guardians had been found. They’ve been back since. The old bank building has been replaced by a broad and soaring tower designed by Norman Foster. He’s also the architect of Bloomberg’s European Headquarters in London where I work. Another thing, in my mind, that binds London and Hong Kong. Stephen to the East, with visible shrapnel damage to his hind leg and torso. Photograph by Howard Chua-Eoan Notes: Please send lionizing commentary and feedback to Howard Chua-Eoan at hchuaeoan@bloomberg.net. [Sign up here]( and follow us on [Instagram](, [TikTok](, [Twitter]( and [Facebook](. Follow Us Like getting this newsletter? 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