Over 43,000 businesses exit Ho Chi Minh City market in 8 months amid cost, demand pressures

The agency reported the figures at a meeting on the city's socioeconomic performance in the first eight months of 2026 and tasks for September on Friday.

Of the 43,093 businesses that exited the market during the period, 9,703 completed dissolution procedures, surging 164.46 percent from a year earlier, while 33,390 temporarily suspended operations, up 7.82 percent.

Meanwhile, the city recorded 38,253 newly established businesses in the first eight months, up 7.9 percent year on year.

Another 13,582 businesses resumed operations during the period, down 2.9 percent from a year ago.

Nguyen Khac Hoang, head of the municipal Statistics Office, said the ratio of businesses entering the market to those leaving was about 10 to 8, meaning that for every 10 businesses entering the market, eight exited.

Hoang, however, noted that the ratio had improved considerably from the beginning of the year.

The relatively high number of businesses leaving the market showed that the private sector was still under pressure from costs, market conditions and its ability to maintain operations, Hoang said.

He stressed that alongside encouraging the establishment of new businesses, the city should pay greater attention to helping existing businesses survive, expand production and improve their competitiveness.

Pham Binh An, deputy head of the Ho Chi Minh City Institute for Development Studies, pointed out that weak demand and a shortage of new orders were among the main reasons businesses were leaving the market.

Declining consumer demand has made it harder for businesses to secure new orders, while logistics costs in Ho Chi Minh City remain high, affecting export prices and other business expenses, An said.

Businesses are also facing difficulties with capital and cash flow.

Although interest rates have generally declined in line with the government's requests, they remain relatively high for small and medium-sized enterprises, he said.

Another challenge is that some businesses lack the resilience and adaptability needed to keep pace with changes such as digital and green transformation.

Small and medium-sized enterprises in particular may not have sufficient resources to follow these trends, An said.

He also pointed to an administrative factor behind the sharp increase in the number of officially dissolved businesses.

According to An, the 164.46 percent surge was partly the result of a campaign to clean up tax identification numbers and address bottlenecks in business administration.

Many businesses had suspended operations without taking further action for years, and authorities only reviewed their status when they began formal dissolution procedures.

As the process was accelerated, the number of officially dissolved businesses rose sharply, a phenomenon that was largely technical in nature and did not necessarily reflect a deterioration in the businesses' actual operations, An said.

The Ho Chi Minh City Institute for Development Studies therefore assessed that the increase in dissolved and exiting businesses would not affect the city's goal of achieving double-digit economic growth.