Việt Nam’s benchmark VN-Index was steady on Tuesday as stocks were hit by strong selling and investors were concerned with the movement of the world stock market.— Photo vietnambiz.vn

HÀ NỘI — Việt Nam’s benchmark VN-Index was steady on Tuesday as stocks were hit by strong selling and investors were concerned with the movement of the world stock market.

The benchmark VN-Index on the HCM Stock Exchange ended almost flat at 1,159.39 points compared to its previous ending level of 1,159.22 points on Monday.

The VN-Index has gained total 3.2 per cent in the last seven consecutive sessions following the latest slight increase.

More than 214 million shares were traded on the southern exchange, worth VNĐ6.32 trillion (US$281 million).

The market breadth was negative as the market was overwhelmed by declining stocks, which outnumbered gainers by 186 to 113.

The VN-Index slowed down its growth towards the end of the session after it surpassed the 1,160-point level, touching 1,166.33 points during the day.

Such improvement of the benchmark index triggered investor selling to make short profits, especially local stocks that had made substantial gains in the previous six sessions.

Pharmaceutical, retailing and food and beverage sectors were among few industries that saw share prices progress while insurance, energy and banking stocks remained negative due to strong investors’ selling.

“Large-cap stocks were also strongly differentiated, causing the benchmark index to trade around its reference level,” BIDV Securities Company (BSC) said in its daily report.

The VN30 Index, which tracks the performance of the 30 largest shares by market capitalisation, gained 0.35 per cent to 1,134.19 points.

However, trading condition within the VN30 basket was highly-risky as it was covered by 17 declining stocks against 12 gainers.

Among gainers were Masan (MSN), FLC Faros Construction (ROS), VPBank (VPB) and Mobile World (MWG) while laggards included PetroVietnam Gas (GAS), dairy producer Vinamilk (VNM) and steel producer Hòa Phát (HPG).

The growth of the VN-Index slowed down as investors were weighed down by negative news from the world stock market, BSC said.

That created profit-taking pressure at the beginning of the day, which kept dragging towards the end of the session, alongside decreased liquidity putting the market into a highly-volatile condition, the company added.

“The VN-Index will continue trading around the range of 1,160-1,165 points as conservative sentiment still dominates the market as a consequence of recent global information.”

The minor HNX Index on the Hà Nội Stock Exchange added 0.88 per cent to close at 135.28 points. The northern market index has rallied total 7.7 per cent in the last nine trading days.

More than 60.5 million shares were traded on the northern bourse, worth VNĐ987 billion.

On the Unlisted Public Company Market (UPCoM), the UPCOM Index inched down 0.06 per cent to end at 61.08 points with more than 31.8 million shares being traded, worth VNĐ778.5 billion. — VNS