Its electric cars have been dogged by poor reviews and it’s on pace to make fewer sales this year than General Motors does in a week.
Yet that hasn’t stopped VinFast Auto from becoming the latest beneficiary of speculative fervour around newly minted Spac deals – many of which end up tumbling over the long-term.
The Vietnamese auto maker’s shares surged 255 per cent on Tuesday when it debuted on the Nasdaq Global Select Market, pushing the company’s market capitalisation above that of industry giants GM and Mercedes-Benz Group.
It added $39 billion to the net worth of chairman Pham Nhat Vuong, whose fortune now stands at $44.3 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
It’s the latest example of a thinly traded company soaring on its debut after completing a merger with a special-purpose acquisition company.
Many have experienced eye-popping rallies that ended a few trading sessions after the merger closed, as traders look to make a quick profit on companies with limited shares – meaning the jump in Mr Vuong’s wealth may be short-lived.
De-Spacs – the term for firms that go public via a Spac merger – that have made their debut this year have seen a median slump of about 45 per cent, with 18 of them wiping out more than 70 per cent of their value, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Regulatory filings show Mr Vuong, Vietnam’s richest man, directly and indirectly controls 99 per cent of the company’s outstanding shares, mostly through his conglomerate, Vingroup.
That large stake limits the shares available for other investors to trade, meaning the stock is prone to large swings. The Bloomberg Billionaires index hasn’t previously included Vuong’s stake in the car maker, which he founded in 2017.
If VinFast can hold on to its gains, it will be in a somewhat unique position given the dismal performance of other electric car makers taken public via Spacs, including Lordstown Motors, Nikola and Faraday Future Intelligent Electric, all of which lost more than 90 per cent of their market value since their mergers.
VinFast, though, has been weighed down by operational problems.
In May, it recalled all the electric sport utility vehicles shipped to the US over a software malfunction and there have been some negative reviews. The company also cut some of its US workforce, sales have been modest and its net losses are widening.
“There have been some negative reviews,” VinFast chief executive Le Thi Thu Thuy told Bloomberg Television Tuesday.
“We take them very close to our heart, we reflect on the feedback from those reviews and we make our vehicles better.”
In the six years it has been operating, VinFast has taken in $9.3 billion of financing to cover its operating and capital expenditures, much of it coming from Mr Vuong’s other businesses.
Still, the company, which began building a factory in North Carolina last month, forecasts sales will reach 45,000 to 50,000 this year and Mr Vuong predicts it will break even by the end of 2024.
VinFast had been planning a normal initial public offering, but scrapped that and opted for a Spac listing after investor appetite for money-losing start-ups waned over the past year. Instead, it agreed to merge with blank-check company Black Spade Acquisition, founded by casino mogul Lawrence Ho.
Mr Vuong, who studied geoeconomic engineering in Russia, made his fortune in the 1990s in Ukraine with a business making instant noodles. The Hanoi-born businessman sold it to Nestle in 2010, nine years after he had returned to Vietnam.
By that time, he’d already established publicly-traded Vingroup, focused on real estate, resorts, schools, shopping malls and more. The firm booked revenue of $4.4 billion last year, and remains a major shareholder in VinFast.
KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
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It Was Just an Accident
Director: Jafar Panahi
Stars: Vahid Mobasseri, Mariam Afshari, Ebrahim Azizi, Hadis Pakbaten, Majid Panahi, Mohamad Ali Elyasmehr
Rating: 4/5
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Lamsa
Founder: Badr Ward
Launched: 2014
Employees: 60
Based: Abu Dhabi
Sector: EdTech
Funding to date: $15 million
LILO & STITCH
Starring: Sydney Elizebeth Agudong, Maia Kealoha, Chris Sanders
Director: Dean Fleischer Camp
Rating: 4.5/5
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In numbers: China in Dubai
The number of Chinese people living in Dubai: An estimated 200,000
Number of Chinese people in International City: Almost 50,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2018/19: 120,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2010: 20,000
Percentage increase in visitors in eight years: 500 per cent
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Mohammed bin Zayed Majlis
Jetour T1 specs
Engine: 2-litre turbocharged
Power: 254hp
Torque: 390Nm
Price: From Dh126,000
Available: Now
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Sholto Byrnes on Myanmar politics
MOUNTAINHEAD REVIEW
Starring: Ramy Youssef, Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman
Director: Jesse Armstrong
Rating: 3.5/5
Why seagrass matters
- Carbon sink: Seagrass sequesters carbon up to 35X faster than tropical rainforests
- Marine nursery: Crucial habitat for juvenile fish, crustations, and invertebrates
- Biodiversity: Support species like sea turtles, dugongs, and seabirds
- Coastal protection: Reduce erosion and improve water quality
KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
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The biog
Most memorable achievement: Leading my first city-wide charity campaign in Toronto holds a special place in my heart. It was for Amnesty International’s Stop Violence Against Women program and showed me the power of how communities can come together in the smallest ways to have such wide impact.
Favourite film: Childhood favourite would be Disney’s Jungle Book and classic favourite Gone With The Wind.
Favourite book: To Kill A Mockingbird for a timeless story on justice and courage and Harry Potters for my love of all things magical.
Favourite quote: “We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” — Winston Churchill
Favourite food: Dim sum
Favourite place to travel to: Anywhere with natural beauty, wildlife and awe-inspiring sunsets.
Zayed Sustainability Prize
How to wear a kandura
Dos
- Wear the right fabric for the right season and occasion
- Always ask for the dress code if you don’t know
- Wear a white kandura, white ghutra / shemagh (headwear) and black shoes for work
- Wear 100 per cent cotton under the kandura as most fabrics are polyester
Don’ts
- Wear hamdania for work, always wear a ghutra and agal
- Buy a kandura only based on how it feels; ask questions about the fabric and understand what you are buying
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Name: Dhabia Khalifa AlQubaisi
Age: 23
How she spends spare time: Playing with cats at the clinic and feeding them
Inspiration: My father. He’s a hard working man who has been through a lot to provide us with everything we need
Favourite book: Attitude, emotions and the psychology of cats by Dr Nicholes Dodman
Favourit film: 101 Dalmatians - it remind me of my childhood and began my love of dogs
Word of advice: By being patient, good things will come and by staying positive you’ll have the will to continue to love what you're doing
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BIGGEST CYBER SECURITY INCIDENTS IN RECENT TIMES
SolarWinds supply chain attack: Came to light in December 2020 but had taken root for several months, compromising major tech companies, governments and its entities
Microsoft Exchange server exploitation: March 2021; attackers used a vulnerability to steal emails
Kaseya attack: July 2021; ransomware hit perpetrated REvil, resulting in severe downtime for more than 1,000 companies
Log4j breach: December 2021; attackers exploited the Java-written code to inflitrate businesses and governments
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Company%20profile
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The five pillars of Islam
The five pillars of Islam
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Engine: Dual-motor all-wheel-drive electric
Range: Up to 610km
Power: 905hp
Torque: 985Nm
Price: From Dh439,000
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Jewel of the Expo 2020
252 projectors installed on Al Wasl dome
13.6km of steel used in the structure that makes it equal in length to 16 Burj Khalifas
550 tonnes of moulded steel were raised last year to cap the dome
724,000 cubic metres is the space it encloses
Stands taller than the leaning tower of Pisa
Steel trellis dome is one of the largest single structures on site
The size of 16 tennis courts and weighs as much as 500 elephants
Al Wasl means connection in Arabic
World’s largest 360-degree projection surface
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Europe’s rearming plan
- Suspend strict budget rules to allow member countries to step up defence spending
- Create new "instrument" providing €150 billion of loans to member countries for defence investment
- Use the existing EU budget to direct more funds towards defence-related investment
- Engage the bloc's European Investment Bank to drop limits on lending to defence firms
- Create a savings and investments union to help companies access capital
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Skewed figures
In the village of Mevagissey in southwest England the housing stock has doubled in the last century while the number of residents is half the historic high. The village's Neighbourhood Development Plan states that 26% of homes are holiday retreats. Prices are high, averaging around £300,000, £50,000 more than the Cornish average of £250,000. The local average wage is £15,458.
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The rules on fostering in the UAE
A foster couple or family must:
- be Muslim, Emirati and be residing in the UAE
- not be younger than 25 years old
- not have been convicted of offences or crimes involving moral turpitude
- be free of infectious diseases or psychological and mental disorders
- have the ability to support its members and the foster child financially
- undertake to treat and raise the child in a proper manner and take care of his or her health and well-being
- A single, divorced or widowed Muslim Emirati female, residing in the UAE may apply to foster a child if she is at least 30 years old and able to support the child financially
