VN-Index down 7 points as blue chips fall

This was the biggest drop for the VN-Index, which represents stocks on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE), Vietnam’s main bourse, in the last two weeks.

On HoSE, 218 stocks lost and 112 stocks gained. Order-matched transactions also rose 6 percent over Monday session to VND3.35 trillion ($144.6 million), the highest in the past week.

The VN30 Index for Vietnam’s 30 biggest market cap stocks shed 1.05 percent, with 22 stocks losing and only two gaining. Half of the stocks in this basket dropped over one percent this session.

VRE of retail corporation Vincom Retail, a subsidiary of Vietnam’s biggest private conglomerate Vingroup, led the losers with 2.9 percent. It was followed by HPG by steel-making giant Hoa Phat Group, which dropped 2.5 percent, and HDB of private lender HDBank, down 2.2 percent.

All banking stocks except one fell, with those of Vietnam’s three biggest state-owned lenders by assets, CTG of VietinBank, BID of BIDV, and VCB of Vietcombank falling 1.1 percent, 0.8 percent, and 0.2 percent respectively.

VIC shares of Vingroup was one of six stocks that kept their opening price, while VHM of the group’s real estate arm Vinhomes fell 0.7 points. These are currently the biggest market cap stocks on HoSE.

EIB of private mid-sized lender Eximbank and MWG of electronics retail giant Mobile World were the only stocks to gain in this session, going up 0.6 and 0.1 percent respectively.

Transactions by foreign investors were fairly balanced with a net sell of VND3.5 billion ($151,000), with buying pressure mostly on Vietnam’s three biggest state-owned banks, and selling pressure on HPG of Hoa Phat Group and VCB of Vietcombank.

Meanwhile, the HNX-Index for stocks on Hanoi Stock Exchange, Vietnam’s second main bourse for small and mid-cap stocks, fell 0.32 percent, while the UPCoM-Index for Unlisted Public Companies rose 0.37 percent.