SeABank's bank teller talks to a customer at its office. The lender's shares hit the biggest daily gain on Friday, leading the market's bullish trend. — Photo courtesy of the bank

HÀ NỘI — The stock market ended the week on a positive note, with the benchmark VN-Index rising for the seventh day in a row, despite spending most of the trading day in negative territory.

The VN-Index, representing the Hochiminh Stock Exchange (HoSE), closed at 1,832 points, up 0.56 points from the previous session. Over the seven-session rally, the benchmark index has accumulated more than 105 points. This marked its longest run of gains this year.

Trading was volatile throughout the session. The VN-Index stayed above its reference level for only a few minutes in the morning before selling pressure pushed it lower, at one point sending the index below the 1,820-point mark.

Despite the index's gain, market breadth leaned towards the downside. On HoSE, 162 stocks declined while 141 advanced. Liquidity, however, improved from the previous trade, rising to nearly VNĐ 17.4 trillion (US$666 million).

Chemical, healthcare, travel and leisure, and real estate stocks weighed on the market, while technology, telecommunications, banking, resources and oil and gas shares provided support.

Data compiled by a financial website, vietstock.vn, showed that banking stocks, including SeABank (SSB), Sacombank (STB) and VPBank (VPB), helped underpin the benchmark. 

In contrast, Vinhomes (VHM), Techcombank (TCB) and Vietnam Rubber Group (GVR) were among the biggest drags on the VN-Index. 

On the Hanoi Stock Exchange (HNX), the HNX-Index also finished higher at 284.77 points, up 2.13 points. Investors poured over VNĐ1.1 trillion into the northern bourse, equal to a trading volume of nearly 72 million shares. 

Foreign investors continued to provide support, recording net purchases of around VNĐ335 billion on HoSE and over VNĐ4.2 billion on HNX.

Friday also marked the final trading session of August. The VN-Index gained more than 96 points during the month, equivalent to an increase of 5.55 per cent.

The market now enters the National Day holiday and will resume trading on Thursday, September 3.

Ahead of today's session, Beta Securities (BSI) said investor caution could increase during the final trading day of the week and the last session before the holiday, as market participants might be reluctant to expand their positions and instead prioritise risk management.

According to BSI, maintaining an appropriate portfolio allocation and prioritising stocks with solid fundamentals would allow investors to remain more proactive in dealing with unpredictable market fluctuations. — BIZHUB/VNS