Vietnamese robo advisor Tikop Ứng dụng tiết kiệm và đầu tư

Today I'm checking out this a foreign robo advisor app from Vietnam called Tikop. It's not the 1st robo advisor but the latest robo advisor in Vietnam. The other earlier launched robo advisors in Vietnam are Finhay and Infina. In Vietnam, they don't really call it a robo advisor but more of a wealth management app.

Tikop is still very new compared to its peers, launched in year 2020 by a company called Techlab. The workd Tikop literally means accumulate (tích cóp). Interestingly the parent company Techlab is a Cybersecurity firm so the aspect of tech security in this app should be quite ok.

The features by Tikop is very similar to present day robo advisors (eg think KDI Kenanga). They have Savings product (tích lu) and Investment product (đầu tư). The savings product is more like a money money fund, liquid and safe and Investment product is a risk based investment product that invests into stocks and ETFs (quỹ đầu tư).

Minimum investment starts at 50,000 VND (~RM10) only 😧 .

The savings products gives around 8% returns per annum, slightly more than what Vietnamese bank fixed deposits at 5%. These rates seem high but their loans (vay) given by banks is a whopping 10% so it's quite normal for these high rates.

There does not seem to be a management fee (phí quản lý) charged for the wealth management services, most likely the app earns money from commissions paid for purchasing ETFs and funds.

The investment product on the other hands invests in Vietnamese market ETFs and funds (quỹ ETF, quỹ đầu tư). Eg PBVF ETFs, DCDS (Dragon Capital).

Overall the apps feels very similar to existing robo advisors in the market in Malaysia. The Vietnamese population is around 100 million compared to 30 million only in Malaysia and as such there's still a lot of room for robo advisors to grow in Vietnam. Not to mention the younger demographics of the Vietnamese population.

The app sign up is only valid for Vietnamese citizens and require a Vietnamese mobile number (+84) and Vietnamese bank account (BIDV, Sacombank, TPbank, Vietcombank). I've tested putting in 5,500,000 Vietnamese Dong (VND) equivalent to roughly RM1,000 using the most aggressive settings (gói mạo hiểm) , let's see how it goes. BIDV bank will act as trustee for the money.

Some of my funds now reach FUEMAV30 ETF managed by Mirae Assets. My favorite Vietnamese stock Masan (MSN) is inside this ETF.

For Malaysians, access to Vietnamese equities/stocks are limited to mutual funds. Public Mutual Berhad has got 2 funds that have exposure to Vietnamese equities/stocks, PB Vietnam Global 40 fund and Public Vietnam Global equity fund. These 2 funds are quite diluted with Chinese tech equities like Alibaba and MeiTuan so most Malaysians don't have access to a pure Vietnamese play fund.

It is important to be aware that, unlike Malaysia, Vietnam does not yet have a regulatory framework in place for Fintech companies. As a result, investment applications such as Infina carry a certain degree of risk. In Vietnam, the governing body responsible for securities-related regulations is the SSC (Vietnam State Securities Commission), whereas its counterpart in Malaysia is the Securities Commission.

Updates 20220407

My initial investment 550,000 VND has been fully invested into the following ETF/funds already.