HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam — It's hard to see hints of an economic downturn on the horn-blaring streets of this commercial hub.
High-end restaurants are overflowing, fashionably dressed young women fill chic stores, and everyone seems to be talking on cell phones while plowing motorbikes through roundabouts swarming with Honda scooters and SUV taxis. Vietnam's main stock market, after losing 66 percent last year, has been riding a seven-month high, up more than 20 percent this year.
But the conspicuous consumption masks the reality that the global economic implosion is rippling across the Pacific and jolting this Communist Southeast Asian country, which had enthusiastically ridden the rising tide of globalization. Small Taiwanese manufacturers of low-end tech products silently closed plants in Vietnam for good during the New Year Tet celebration without telling workers.
