HCMC – On the 20th birthday anniversary on July 20 of the local stock market, trading activities turned gloomy with the VN-Index of the Hochiminh Stock Exchange losing over 10 points and closing at its intraday low.
Cautious investor sentiment had dampened the local market right in the morning session, with liquidity remaining low.
The increased selling pressure formed in the afternoon coupled with weak demand dragged down the benchmark index by 10.62 points, or 1.22% against last Friday to 861.4, with 282 losers and 112 gainers.
Trading on the southern bourse inched up a slight 5% in volume and 4% in value at 285 million shares worth over VND4.7 trillion. Shares transacted in block deals contributed VND937 billion to the overall value.
All of the largecaps were losers and many of them extended huge losses. Stocks declining by some 2% included lender BID, steelmaker HPG, consumer goods producer MSN, and retailer VRE. Besides this, property developer VIC and its housing affiliate VHM, gas firm GAS, and lenders CTG, VPB, and MBB dropped approximately 1.5%. The remaining stocks in the group fell less than 1%.
Of them, steelmaker HPG took the lead for liquidity with matching volume reaching 11.6 million shares. Lender STB ranked second with over eight million shares changing hands, followed by its two fellows MBB and CTG.
Meanwhile, industrial zone developer ITA ended in positive territory as it gained 4.4% to close at VND4,900. It was also the most actively traded stock on the southern bourse, with 13.8 million shares transacted. Other stocks such as SZC, DAH, GTN bucked the market downward trend.
In the Hanoi market, the HNX-Index shed 1.09 points, or 0.93% over the session earlier to 115.72, with 62 stocks advancing and 81 others falling. Property group HUT led the northern bourse by liquidity, with 5.5 million shares traded, and closed at its reference price.
Insurer PVI and plastics company NTP were the only two stocks among bigcaps that made gains, while the rest inched down.
