PNJ's flagship store in District 1, HCM City. The company's share hit the maximum daily loss of 7 per cent yesterday, contributing to the bear market. Photo pnj.com.vn

HÀ NỘI — The market settled down on Monday, with the benchmark VN-Index posting a loss of nearly 60 points, as strong selling pressure weighed on investors’ sentiment. 

The VN-Index on the Hồ Chí Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE) plunged by 59.64 points, or 4.49 per cent, to 1,269.62 points, the lowest in the last nine months. The selling force became stronger after the noon break. In the morning trade, it lost over 47 points (3.55 per cent). Last week it dropped by 2.75 per cent. 

The market’s breadth remained negative with 445 stocks declining, of which up to 233 stocks posted the maximum daily loss of 7 per cent. Liquidity, however, was higher than the previous session with nearly VNĐ18.8 trillion (US$818 million) worth of stocks, equivalent to a trading volume of more than 673.76 million shares, traded on the southern bourse. 

The index’s sharp fall was due to strong sell-off activities since the market opened. Stocks across all sectors plunged with the 30 biggest stocks tracker VN30-Index decreasing 59.17 points, or 4.31 per cent, to 1,315.04 points. 

Of the VN30 basket, all 30 stocks slid yesterday with 13 stocks hitting floor prices. 

Data compiled by vietstock.vn showed that in the top five stocks influencing the market bearish trend, four stocks dropped 7 per cent - the biggest intraday loss on HoSE, which were BIDV (BID), VPBank (VPB), Techcombank (TCB) and Vietinbank (CTG). The other stock was PV Gas (GAS), down 4.46 per cent. 

The index was also weighed by great losses of Hoà Phát Group (HPG), Viecombank (VCB), Mobile World Investment Corporation (MWG), Vietnam Rubber Group (GVR), MBBank (MBB) and Phú Nhuận Jewelry JSC. These stocks saw a decline of at least 1.89 per cent. 

The downtrend was in line with expectations from many securities firms that the VN-Index is likely to breach the support level of 1,300 points this week, as the market is short of cash flows and leading stocks. 

On the Hà Nội Stock Exchange (HNX), the HNX-Index also finished lower yesterday on strong selling force. The index closed the trade at 323.39 points, down 20.07 points, or 5.84 per cent. 

During the session, nearly 98.4 million shares were traded on HNX, worth over VNĐ2 trillion. 

Meanwhile, foreign investors were net buyers on both main exchanges, with a net buy value of VNĐ589.32 billion. Of which, they net bought nearly VNĐ15.1 billion on the northern market and VNĐ574.24 billion on HoSE. VNS