VN-Index sees biggest losing session in over a year

An overwhelming 274 stocks lost and just 80 gained on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE), on which the benchmark VN-Index is based, as trading opened after a one-week Tet (Lunar New Year) break.

Order-matched transactions surged to VND3.85 trillion ($166.4 million) from VND2.5 trillion ($108 million) on January 22, the last session before the Tet break, and making Thursday the session with highest liquidity in the past two months.

The index’s 3.22 percent drop also erased all gains it made in January, bringing it down below its level at the end of 2019, when it closed at 961 points.

The VN30-Index for Vietnam’s 30 biggest market caps plunged further with 3.66 percent, with 27 stocks losing and only 1 gaining. In this basket, 24 stocks lost over 2 percent, of which eight lost over 5 percent.

MSN of food conglomerate Masan Group and SAB of Vietnam’s biggest brewer Sabeco led losses this session, both falling 6.2 percent, coming close to their 7 percent floor prices.

They were followed by BVH of insurance giant Bao Viet, down 5.8 percent, and stocks of mid-sized lenders TCB of Techcombank and MBB of state-owned Military Bank, which shed 5.4 percent and 5.1 percent respectively.

Vietnam’s three biggest state-owned lenders by assets, BID of BDIV, CTG of VietinBank, and VCB of Vietcombank, dropped 5 percent, 4.9 percent and 4.8 percent respectively. The three banks had been some of the best gainers in the past months in most sessions, having reported surging profits in 2019.

Analysts say the VN-Index’s movement has mirrored negative sentiment in key Asian markets, which are seeing major selloffs as a result of the coronavirus epidemic.

The new deadly pneumonia virus, which was first reported in China’s Wuhan City in December, has so far killed 170 and infected 7,700 in mainland China.

Airlines around the world have suspended flights to China in response, and economists have forecasted that the virus could disrupt China’s economy, and in turn, the global economy.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 dropped 1.72 percent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng plunged 2.6 percent, and South Korea’s Kospi fell 1.71 percent.

Mainland China’s Shanghai Composite and Shenzhen Component have not yet opened for trading after China’s financial regulators decided to extend the exchanges’ Lunar New Year break until February 3, in response to the epidemic.