Flow ball

A company in the southern province of Binh Duong advertises job openings. Photo laodong.vn

Companies in the city’s industrial parks and export processing zones need around 12,000 workers, including 2,540 with a university degree, according to the HCM City Export Processing and Industrial Zones Authority (HEPZA).

Another 4,700 jobs are available for applicants with college and vocational education, and the rest are for manual workers, Hung Hua Quoc Hung, head of HEPZA, said.

The textile and footwear sectors have the largest demand, he added.

The HCM City Centre for Forecasting Manpower Needs and Labour Market Information said the city overall is expected to need 30,000 workers after the Tet holiday.

Do Thanh Van, deputy director of the centre, said trade, services, textile and footwear, food processing, logistics, IT, plastics, and chemicals are among the industries with the highest recruitment demand.

PouYuen Việt Nam Co. Ltd in Tan Binh District, one of the companies with the largest demand, needs more than 2,000 workers for various positions such as IT technicians, office and purchase staff, secretaries, quality management staff, and manual workers.

Le Minh Tan, director of the city Department of Labour, Invalid and Social Affairs, said all businesses have resumed operations after Tet with around 96 per cent of workers returning to work.

In Binh Duong Province, a manufacturing hub, more than 95 per cent of workers have returned, according to its Federation of Labour.

The federation also said 916 enterprises require 95,983 workers after Tet.

Dong Nai Province, another manufacturing hub, too needs thousands of workers to meet the expected increase in production this year.

Cao Duy Thai, head of the wage office at the province Department of Labour, Invalid, and Social Affairs, said the worker turnover rate during Tet this year is unusually low since more and more enterprises are offering benefits to retain workers, making it a tough to hire new staff.

Positive hiring outlook

According to ManpowerGroup Vietnam’s 2021 Employment Outlook survey, employers in various industries are expecting hiring to recover and grow in the first half of 2021 despite the continuing pandemic.

The survey polled 442 human resources and talent acquisition executives in 16 industries.

While 36.4 per cent said their businesses were slightly impacted by the pandemic, nearly 50 per cent said they still operate normally.

Some 56 per cent anticipated a payroll expansion while 37 per cent said they would maintain the headcount.

Only 6.6 per cent plan to lay off workers.

Two-thirds expect hiring to increase within the next three months, and 22 per cent foresee an expansion in the next six months.

The biggest recruitment plans in the period are in manufacturing, construction, wholesale, retail and trading, and transport and logistics.

The construction sector saw a revival thanks to economic growth, and accounts for a fifth of all companies planning to hire, the same as manufacturing.

Nguyen Thu Trang, country head of permanent recruitment, executive search and consulting services at ManpowerGroup Vietnam, said: “Thanks to the effective control measurements and the strong anti-epidemic compliance of the Vietnamese, the economy is showing signs of positive recovery. In addition, foreign investment continues to flow into Vietnam, creating more business and job opportunities.  VNS

LONDON — In October 2020, Miami-based art collector Pablo Rodriguez-Fraile spent almost $67,000 on a 10-second video artwork that he could have watched for free online. Last week, he sold it for $6.6 million.

The video by digital artist Beeple, whose real name is Mike Winkelmann, was authenticated by blockchain, which serves as a digital signature to certify who owns it and that it is the original work.

It’s a new type of digital asset – known as a non-fungible token (NFT) – that has exploded in popularity during the pandemic as enthusiasts and investors scramble to spend enormous sums of money on items that only exist online.

Blockchain technology allows the items to be publicly authenticated as one-of-a-kind, unlike traditional online objects which can be endlessly reproduced.

“You can go in the Louvre and take a picture of the Mona Lisa and you can have it there, but it doesn’t have any value because it doesn’t have the provenance or the history of the work,” said Rodriguez-Fraile, who said he first bought Beeple’s piece because of his knowledge of the U.S.-based artist’s work.

“The reality here is that this is very, very valuable because of who is behind it.”

Examples of NFTs range from digital artworks and sports cards to pieces of land in virtual environments or exclusive use of a cryptocurrency wallet name, akin to the scramble for domain names in the early days of the internet.“Non-fungible” refers to items that cannot be exchanged on a like-for-like basis, as each one is unique – in contrast to “fungible” assets like dollars, stocks or bars of gold.

The computer-generated video sold by Rodriguez-Fraile shows what appears to be a giant Donald Trump collapsed on the ground, his body covered in slogans, in an otherwise idyllic setting.

OpenSea, a marketplace for NFTs, said it has seen monthly sales volume grow to $86.3 million so far in February, as of Friday, from $8 million in January, citing blockchain data. Monthly sales were at $1.5 million a year ago.

“If you spend 10 hours a day on the computer, or eight hours a day in the digital realm, then art in the digital realm makes tonnes of sense – because it is the world,” said OpenSea’s co-founder Alex Atallah.

Investors caution, however, that while big money is flowing into NFTs, the market could represent a price bubble.

Like many new niche investment areas, there is the risk of major losses if the hype dies down, while there could be prime opportunities for fraudsters in a market where many participants operate under pseudonyms.

Nonetheless, auction house Christie’s has just launched its first-ever sale of digital art – a collage of 5,000 pictures, also by Beeple – which exists solely as an NFT.

Christie’s ’embraces terrifying’

Bids for the work have hit $3 million, with the sale due to close on March 11.

“We are in a very unknown territory. In the first 10 minutes of bidding we had more than a hundred bids from 21 bidders and we were at a million dollars,” said Noah Davis, specialist in post-war and contemporary art at Christie’s.

His division has never seen an online-only sale top $1 million before, he added.

In a decision that could help push cryptocurrencies further into the mainstream, the auction house that was founded in 1766 will accept payment in the digital coin Ether as well as traditional money.

“I think that this moment was inevitable and whenever institutions of any kind try to resist inevitability, it does not work out very well,” Davis said of accepting crypto payment. “And so the best thing you can do is embrace the terrifying.”

$280k for Lebron James slam dunk

NFTs could be benefiting from the hype around cryptocurrencies and blockchain, as well as virtual reality’s potential to create online worlds. The growing interest also coincides with a surge in online retail trading during lockdowns.

The start of the rush for NFTs has been linked with the launch of the U.S. National Basketball Association’s Top Shot website, which allows users to buy and trade NFTs in the form of video highlights of games.

Five months after its launch, the platform says it has over 100,000 buyers and nearly $250 million in sales. The majority of sales take place in the site’s peer-to-peer marketplace, with the NBA getting a royalty on every sale.

The volume is rapidly rising: February has seen sales totalling $198 million as of Friday, heading for a fivefold increase from January’s $44 million, Top Shot said.

Each collectible has “a unique serial number with guaranteed scarcity and protected ownership guaranteed by blockchain”, the site says. “When you own #23/49 of a legendary LeBron James dunk, you’re the only person in the world who does.”

The biggest transaction to date was on Feb. 22, when a user paid $208,000 for a video of a LeBron James slam dunk.

One major NFT enthusiast, who goes by the pseudonym “Pranksy” told Reuters he had invested $600 in an early NFT project in 2017 and has now built that up to a portfolio “worth seven figures” in NFTs and cryptocurrencies. He asked to be anonymous to protect his family’s privacy.

Pranksy said he has now spent more than $1 million on Top Shot and made about $4.7 million by reselling purchases. Reuters was unable to independently verify the figures, although NBA Top Shot confirmed he is among the site’s biggest buyers.

“I see them as investments really, much like any other collectibles and NFTs that currently exist,” he said in an interview conducted via Twitter. “I’d never watched a game of basketball before Top Shot launched.”

‘Emergence of the metaverse’

Nate Hart, a Nashville-based NFT investor who, like Pranksy, has been involved in the market since it first developed in 2017, has seen some popular digital art NFTs such as Autoglyphs and CryptoPunk surge in value.

Hart said he bought a LeBron James Cosmic NFT on NBA Top Shot for $40,000 in January, then sold it for $125,000 in February.

“We’re in awe, it just doesn’t feel real. We were in the right place, right time, got lucky, but we also took that risk,” he said.

“The space has been growing a lot. I do think that this is a little bit of a bubble. It is a bubble,” he said. “It’s hard to predict what the top will be.”

Andrew Steinwold, who launched a $6 million dollar NFT investment fund in January, warned that the majority of NFTs could become worthless in future.

But, like many backers, he is confident that some items will retain their value and that NFTs represent the future of digital ownership, paving the way for a world in which people live, socialise and make money in virtual environments.

“We’re spending a lot of our time digitally, always online, always plugged in. It makes sense to now add property rights to the mix and suddenly we have the emergence of the metaverse,” he said.

“I think it’s going to reach into the trillions of dollars one day.”

A worker at clothing factory Haivina in Gia Lộc District, Hải Dương Province, is tested for COVID-19 before resuming work. — VNA/VNS Photo Mạnh Minh

HÀ NỘI — With the local COVID-19 outbreaks gradually being brought under control, the northern province of Hải Dương will lift some restrictions in certain areas on March 3, after 15 days of stringent province-wide lockdown measures.

Since January 27, the province has recorded over 600 COVID-19 local infections (nearly 300 have recovered), becoming the largest outbreak in the country since the pandemic began early last year, mostly centred around a number of hotspots.

Phạm Xuân Thăng, Secretary of Hải Dương Party Committee, at Monday’s meeting on COVID-19, said the outbreaks in the province are gradually being brought under control: “It’s time the fight against the pandemic turns to a new chapter, maintaining a balance between socio-economic development and keeping the pandemic in check.”

Hải Dương Party Committee said the anti-pandemic measures must cause the least possible disruptions to socio-economic development, the flow of goods, and business activities in the province.

Hải Dương authorities agreed to divide the localities in the province into two groups under different restrictions depending on the COVID-19 risks.

Four high-risk localities, including Hải Dương City, Kinh Môn township, Cẩm Giàng District and Kim Thành, will be placed under the Government’s Directive 15, the highest level of social distancing first introduced in March last year when the country entered nationwide lockdown. The directive prescribes limiting large gatherings, meetings with over 20 people in-doors or 10 people outdoors, maintaining two metres distance between individuals in public places, non-essential services are shut down, public passenger transport are halted, and travel is heavily restricted.

The remaining eight localities in the province will follow the less restrictive Government’s Directive 19 on social distancing norms.

Hải Dương will continue to halt festivals, religious rituals, sporting events and other unimportant events that require large gatherings in public.

Entertainment venues, tourism venues, sport centres, beauty parlors, hairdressing shops, karaoke bars, massage parlours, bars, discotheques, restaurants, cafes and lottery stalls will continue to be closed.

People are urged to halt weddings, while funerals need to be held with caution in mind.

Factories and plants can resume work, but the owners will need to sign documents with the local authorities affirming their commitment to COVID-19 safety. Factories and plants are urged to routinely test their employees and managers for COVID-19.

Service venues – retail/wholesale trading shops, shopping malls, markets, supermarkets, hotels, accommodation facilities, etc. – can resume operations, but must observe COVID-19 prevention and control measures.

Remote learning will continue until when outbreaks are completely under control, at least March 17.

Inter-provincial and intra-provincial passenger transport can resume, but anti-pandemic measures need to be ensured in line with the guidelines from the Ministry of Transport.

Areas under lockdown due to new cases will continue until the order expires.

Secretary Thăng stressed the outbreaks could still recur if the local authorities are careless and let their guard down, and that the leaders will be held primarily accountable for the situation under their jurisdiction.

In the coming days, there might continue to be new cases found in the quarantine facilities or out in the community, but “we don’t need to be worried, given the sufficient experience and resources,” Thăng said. — VNS