HÀ NỘI — Vietnamese shares could not extend the morning growth at the end of Thursday as increased selling in the last minutes hit large-cap stocks on their rallies.

The benchmark VN Index on the Hồ Chí Minh Stock Exchange inched down 0.11 per cent to close at 960.25 points.

The southern market index gained 0.70 per cent on Wednesday and rose as much as 0.58 per cent during Thursday.

The HNX Index on the Hà Nội Stock Exchange dropped 0.35 per cent to end at 107.30 points.

The northern market index advanced 1.02 per cent in the previous session.

Large-cap stocks had took their turns to either drive the market forward or cushion it from falling deeper in the previous sessions.

Thus, those stocks began to “suffer from profit-taking pressure when the market entered the resistance zone”, which was near 970 points, Bảo Việt Securities Company (BVSC) said in its daily report.

The blue-chip VN30 Index narrowed its gain from as much as 0.82 per cent to only 0.13 per cent at the end of the day, finishing Thursday at 928.90 points.

Half of the 30 largest stocks by market capitalisation in the VN30 basket declined while 13 advanced and only two remained still.

Among large-cap decliners were Vietinbank (CTG), Military Bank (MBB), brewer Sabeco (SAB), steel producer Hoa Sen (HSG), Vietcombank (VCB) and digital retailer Mobile World (MWG), which fell between 0.6 per cent and 1.5 per cent.

Among those shares, CTG had gained total 1.7 per cent in the previous two days. The figure for MBB was 1.8 per cent and for SAB was 3 per cent.

Other large-cap firms, which are not included in the VN30 basket, also declined.

Vincom Retail (VRE), the retail arm of property developer Vingroup, shed 0.3 per cent from a two-day growth of 2.5 per cent.

Techcombank (TCB) decreased by 0.7 per cent from a three-day increase of 3.2 per cent.

Investors continued to re-direct money to defensive stocks such as food and beverage, lifting the sector index up 0.6 per cent, data on vietstock.vn showed.

Masan (MSN) and dairy company Vinamilk (VNM) gained 0.1 per cent and 0.7 per cent, respectively.

MSN itself rallied 3.9 per cent in the past five trading days.

“Buying demand is still well absorbing the profit-taking pressure”, proven by moderate liquidity and neutral market breadth, BVSC said.

More than 213.5 million shares were traded on the two local bourses, worth VNĐ4.43 trillion (nearly US$195 million).

The VN Index may keep decreasing to 954-958 points in the first half of the next session, BVSC said. The market would then recover and end Friday on a positive note, BVSC added. — VNS