Vietnamese real estate tycoon Truong My Lan (1st row, C). Photo: Huu Hanh / Tuoi Tre
Lan, the chairwoman of real estate developer Van Thinh Phat Holdings Group, still faces execution, however, after being sentenced to death in another case last year for her role in a $12 billion fraud case, Vietnam's largest on record.
She lost her appeal in that case in December.
The Dan Tri newspaper said that in her appeal in the second case on Monday, the jury found Lan had many mitigating circumstances and had shown repentance, so the court reduced the life sentence to a fixed jail term.
"The court determined that the amount of money recovered and expected to be recovered was very large," the report said
Lan's lawyers did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Lan was found guilty in October of obtaining property by fraud, money laundering and illegal cross-border money transfers.
She was accused of illegally transferring $4.5 billion into and out of Vietnam and laundering VND445 trillion ($18.1 billion), while her companies were accused of illegally raising over VND30 trillion ($1.2 billion) from issuing bonds to investors.
