Profit-taking drives shares down
Profit-taking drives shares down
Shares declined during yesterday's session as profit-taking pressures rose.
Investors sold heavily as they turned wary of holding shares through the long Lunar New Year, or Tet, holiday. The Vietnamese stock market will be open for another three sessions before closing for the holiday.
However, the number of declining stocks was not much higher than the stocks showing increasing prices, thanks to upbeat profit announcements by several companies.
"In addition, the consumer price indices in Ha Noi and HCM City were comparatively low (0.7 per cent and 0.4 per cent, respectively), despite the approaching Tet holiday," noted ACB Securities Co's analyst Hoang Huy.
On the HCM City Stock Exchange, the VN-Index dropped 1.4 per cent to 551.92 points. The VN30 Index also slid 1.3 per cent to end at 626.04 points.
The selling pressure led to a 21.2 per cent increase in the value of trades from Tuesday to nearly VND2.4 trillion (US$113.2 million) on a volume of 125.3 million shares.
Half of the 30 blue chips tracked by the VN30 Index retreated. The share price of steelmaker Hoa Phat (HPG) hit the daily lower price limit, while the share prices of private equity group Masan (MSN), Phu My Fertiliser (DPM), PetroVietnam Drilling Services (PVD) and property developer Vingroup (VIC) slumped 3.1 to 5.4 per cent.
Foreign investors became net sellers on the HCM City bourse by a margin of VND257.2 billion ($13 million).
On the Ha Noi Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index shed 0.2 per cent to finish at 73.42 points.
Large-cap stocks sent the HNX30 Index down 0.16 per cent to 144.29 points.
The trading value and volume were over VND603.9 billion ($28.48 million) and 60.36 million shares, respectively.
Foreign investors remained buyers on the northern bourse, purchasing a net value of shares worth VND20.36 billion ($960,370).
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