Hanoi (VNA) - Vietnamesee-wallets have lured hefty sums from diverse partners over the past time,turning the segment into one of the investment hotspots.

Since late2019, vast money flows have made its way to Vietnam, mainly into e-walletsvia merger and acquisition deals.

Accordingto the Vietnam Investment Review, Vietnamese online gaming giant VNGCorporation has reduced its stake in wholly-owned e-wallet ZaloPay to 60percent by issuing shares to other investors.

VNG hasearned more than 464 billion VND (20.17 million USD) from the deal.

ZaloPay hadlater on scaled up its charter capital to 900 billion VND (39.13 million USD).

LastDecember, China’s Ant Financial, the fintech affiliate of e-commerce giantAlibaba, has quietly acquired a sizeable stake in Vietnamese e-wallet eMonkeyof small Vietnamese fintech firm M-Pay Trade.

Althoughthe deal value has not been disclosed, it was reported that after the deal, theforeign partner would have significant influence and provide technicalexpertise to the e-wallet.

Earlier,VNPAY, a leading Vietnamese digital payments firm, closed a deal withJapan-based SoftBank Vision Fund and Singapore-based sovereign fund GIC.

Accordingly, SoftBank and GIC poured nearly 300 million USD into VNPay, turningthis fintech firm into a market leader who currently provides e-paymentservices to more than 40 banks, five telecom firms, and more than 20,000 localfirms.

Anothermajor deal last year involved VinID JSC which is 80 percent owned by Vingroup –the leading private conglomerate in Vietnam – which had completedprocedures to acquire e-wallet MonPay. The deal value has not been disclosed.

Last year'sline-up of deals continues, including the merger of e-wallets Vimo and mPOS(both under the management of tech startup NextTech Group), or e-wallet Momoreceiving a very large, undisclosed investment from US equity firm WarburgPincus, just to name a few.

Economicexperts forecast that the Vietnamese e-wallet market would be amainstay on investors’ radar this year due to the government’s strongcommitment to spurring non-cash payments and e-wallets’ continuoustempting promotion programmes which help draw in users by the droves.

Accordingto the freshly-released report titled “FinTech in ASEAN: From Start-up toScale-up” by United Overseas Bank (UOB), PwC, and the Singapore FinTechAssociation (SFA), investment in Vietnamese fintech accounts for 36 percent oftotal investment flowing into this field in the whole ASEAN region in 2019,attesting to the charm of Vietnamese fintech firms in the eyes of foreigninvestors.

A recentreport by J.P.Morgan also shows that 19 percent of e-commerce transaction valuein Vietnam takes place via e-wallets. This figure equals that of cash payments,and is behind card payments that take the lead with 34 percent and banktransfer (22 percent)./.