HÀ NỘI — The benchmark VN Index reversed a four-day rise on Monday as large-cap stocks were hit by profit-taking.

Việt Nam’s key stock index finished Monday at 725.35 points, slightly down from Friday’s closing level of 725.37 points.

It had increased by a total of 0.9 per cent in the previous four sessions.

More than 240.8 million shares were traded on the southern bourse, worth VNĐ4.82 trillion (US$214.5 million).

Large-cap stocks underperformed as they were brought down by investors’ looking to gain some short-term profits after the major market witnessed a four-day increase last week, according to Sài Gòn-Hà Nội Securities (SHS).

Half of the 30 largest companies by market capitalisation declined with the decrease in share prices ranging between 0.3 per cent and 2.3 per cent.

Declining blue-chip stocks included Bank for Investment and Development of Việt Nam (BID), information-technology giant FPT Corp (FPT), MBBank (MBB), sugar producer Thành Thành Công Tây Ninh (SBT) and dairy producer Vinamilk (VNM).

On the opposite side, strong gains were seen in shares of property developers, brokerages and agriculture firms.

Among those sectors, property stocks remained highly attractive to investors, occupying six of the 10 most active stocks on the southern bourse.

FLC Group (FLC) and Hoàng Quân Consultancy-Trading-Service Real Estate (HQC) were the two most active stocks. FLC had more than 26 million of its shares being traded and the number for HQC was more than 19 million.

Both FLC and HQC hit their daily trading limits of 6.9 per cent and 6.7 per cent, respectively.

Among brokerages, the strongest gains were found in Sài Gòn Securities (SSI), An Phat Securities (APG), HCM City Securities (HCM) and Agribank Securities (AGR).

Those stocks advanced between 1.4 per cent and 3.1 per cent.

BIDV Securities (BSC) said in its report that the benchmark index is moving sideways around the level of 725 points as the financial flow is now decentralised among large-cap stocks, which are the major pillar of the market.

The brokerage firm added that the market outlook seems positive on current market conditions as the market trading liquidity improved and there was little change in the major index.

On the Hà Nội Stock Exchange, the HNX Index gained 0.79 per cent to end at 91.10 points. The northern market index has risen total 1.3 per cent after the last two days.

Nearly 64.5 million shares were traded on the northern bourse, worth VNĐ748.6 billion. — VNS