US top diplomat Rubio urges Vietnam to address trade imbalance

By Kanishka Singh and David Brunnstrom

WASHINGTON, Jan 24 (Reuters) - New U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio held a call on Friday with Vietnam's Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Bui Thanh Son in which he urged Vietnam to address trade imbalances and also discussed shared concerns about China.

In the call, the first between the two top diplomats under the new administration of U.S. President Donald Trump, the two hailed the 30th anniversary of U.S.-Vietnam relations and progress made under a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership the countries agreed in 2023, a State Department statement said.

"The Secretary also discussed regional concerns to include China's aggressive behavior in the South China Sea," it said.

While praising the two countries' economic cooperation, Rubio "encouraged Vietnam to address trade imbalances," it said.

The U.S. trade deficit with Vietnam exceeded $110 billion in the first 11 months of 2024, U.S. figures released this month show, as exports from the Southeast Asian industrial hub grew amid a record fall of its currency against the dollar.

Although Vietnam has become an important U.S. security partner, the large trade gap is seen by analysts as a major risk for the export-reliant nation amid threats from Trump of across-the-board tariffs on U.S. imports.

The U.S. data from this month showed a nearly 18% rise in the U.S. deficit with Vietnam compared with the same period the previous year. It confirmed the Communist-run country has the fourth highest commercial surplus with the United States, topped only by China, the European Union and Mexico.

Trump ended his first term in the White House with Treasury declarations of Vietnam and Switzerland as currency manipulators over their market interventions to weaken the value of their currencies.

Vietnam, which counts the U.S. as its biggest market, is home to big export-focused industrial operations of U.S. multinationals such as Apple (AAPL), Google, Nike (NKE) and Intel (INTC). (Reporting by Kanishka Singh and David Brunnstrom in Washington; Editing by Mark Porter and Daniel Wallis)