HÀ NỘI — Worries about the mid-term US election and Fed meeting kept market sentiment moderate and the market volatile on Wednesday.

The benchmark VN Index on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange ended at 922.16 points, almost unchanged from its Tuesday’s close of 922.05 points.

The southern market index fell 0.38 per cent in the previous session.

The HNX Index on the Hà Nội Stock Exchange lost 0.34 per cent to close at 104.20 points.

The northern market index has totalled a three-day decline of 1.46 per cent since the beginning of the week.

“The mid-term US election has passed and put some neutral impacts on the world’s stock markets,” Sài Gòn-Hà Nội Securities JSC (SHS) wrote in its daily report.

On Wednesday, the Republicans has taken the Senate after the mid-term US election, while the Democrats has held the House of Representatives, which would make it harder for President Donald Trump to pursue his coming policies.

US stocks futures and Asian shares responded negative to the news as “the impacts of this result on the US-China trade war would be insignificant” and “many Democrats and Republicans agree with Trump’s strategy in the US-China trade war,” Bảo Việt Securities JSC said in a note.

“The attention now goes to the US Federal Reserves’ meeting later on Wednesday (local time)” to see how the Fed plans to raise interest rates in the future, SHS said.

“As global macroeconomic news keeps approaching, it’s easy for the market to move cautiously with low trading liquidity as investors would like to wait for the final results of the events,” SHS said.

More than 173.6 million shares were traded on the two local exchanges, worth VNĐ3.58 trillion (US$159.4 million), slightly lower than Tuesday’s trading figures.

Caution among investors pulled 239 stocks down across the two exchanges, while 168 stocks increased and 63 others ended flat.

The large-cap VN30 Index was negative, dropping 0.04 per cent to 899.25 points at the end of the day.

Of the 30 largest stocks by market capitalisation in the VN30 basket, 17 declined while only eight advanced.

Those 17 stocks lost between 0.3 per cent and 2.5 per cent, including PetroVietnam Gas (GAS), budget carrier Vietjet (VJC), VPBank (VPB) and Petrolimex (PLX).

Foreign investors were net buyers, posting VNĐ75.5 billion in net purchase value. They net-bought VNĐ2.4 billion worth of stocks on Tuesday.

In coming sessions, the two indices will move with broader margins to address their short-term trend, SHS said, adding that the VN Index may move in the range of 910-930 points on Thursday. — VNS