HÀ NỘI — Vietnamese shares rebounded on Friday as investors started hunting for stocks that had declined recently to more attractive price levels.

The benchmark VN-Index rose 1.55 per cent to end at 1,044.85 points, putting an end to its downtrend after falling by total 3.1 per cent in the previous three sessions.

The southern market index also made a weekly gain of 1.7 per cent after five trading sessions this week.

The HNX Index on the Hà Nội Stock Exchange advanced 1.50 per cent to close at 122.77 points. It had totalled a three-day decline of 4.4 per cent.

The northern market index posted a slight growth of 0.1 per cent from the previous week’s end.

Nearly 180.8 million shares were traded on the two local exchanges, worth VNĐ4.74 trillion (US$210.7 million).

Trading liquidity showed signs of reduction as trading volume and value fell 29 per cent and 36 per cent, respectively, from Thursday’s figures.

Large-cap stocks improved and played an important role in driving the two exchanges upwards. The VN30 Index, which tracks the performance of the 30 largest stocks by market capitalisation, increased by 1.1 per cent to 1,030.79 points.

Nearly two-thirds of the 30 largest stocks in the VN30 basket ended on a positive note with strong growth seen in PetroVietnam Gas (GAS), Vietinbank (CTG), Bank for Investment and Development of Việt Nam (BID) and MBBank (MBB).

The banking sector was also one of the best-performing industries among all 20 sectors on the stock market as its industry index jumped 3.3 per cent, data on vietstock.vn showed.

It was followed by the real estate, retail, securities, seafood production and construction sectors.

In those sectors, VNDirect Securities Co (VND) hit its daily increasing band of 7 per cent after the brokerage company on Friday announced the recent investigation of the payment method provider HomeDirect, in which VNDirect holds 15 per cent stake (VNĐ7.5 billion) would not dampen its business activities.

On the negative side, insurance companies, energy firms and food and beverage producers continued to weigh down market sentiment.

After struggling in the previous sessions, the market extended its downtrend in Friday’s early trading session and the indexes continued to search for their short-term bottom levels, BIDV Securities Co (BSC) said in its daily report.

However, strong buying from investors seeking stocks that had fallen sharply in recent days picked up the two local indices, resulting in a growth of nearly 16 points for the VN-Index, BSC said.

“This recovery has made the market psychology more comfortable and positive,” BSC said. The brokerage firm believed market sentiment would improve following the market’s recovery on Friday.

But investors should be careful of a bull trap given the recent reduction in trading liquidity, BSC added. — VNS