A customer at TPBank head office in Hà Nội. The bank shares gained 1.6 per cent on Wednesday. — VNA/VNS Photo Trần Việt

HÀ NỘI — The financial-banking sector’s growth remained strong to keep Vietnamese shares steady at a three-month high on Wednesday afternoon.

The benchmark VN-Index on the Hồ Chí Minh Stock Exchange was little changed on Wednesday, closing up only 0.06 per cent at the three-month high of 900.00 points.

The VN-Index slid 0.05 per cent on Tuesday.

More than 542.8 million shares were traded on the southern bourse, worth VNĐ7.13 trillion (US$309.2 million). Of which, order-matching transactions were worth VNĐ6.37 trillion.

After being hit in the early period of the day, the VN-Index bounced back quickly to the 900-point level on the purchase of low-priced stocks.

The blue-chip tracker VN30-Index increased by 0.25 per cent and the small-cap and mid-cap trackers advanced 1.58 per cent and 1.03 per cent, respectively.

Financial-banking stocks spearheaded the market rebound and kept the VN-Index stable at 900 points.

The sub-indices that track banks, insurers and securities firms’ performances gained between 0.3 per cent and 1.1 per cent, according to vietstock.vn.

Gainers in the three sectors included Vietinbank (CTG), Techcombank (TCB), Military Bank (MBB), TPBank (TPB), insurer Bảo Việt Holdings (BVH), SSI Securities (SSI) and VietCapital Securities (VCI).

Retailers, agriculture businesses, building contractors, and hospitality and tourism companies also performed well.

On the opposite side, technology, healthcare and pharmaceuticals, food and beverage, and seafood industries weighed on the stock market.

Foreign investors net-bought VNĐ187.2 billion worth of Vietnamese shares. They net-sold a total of VNĐ300 billion worth of local shares on Tuesday.

After an early struggle, the market balanced at the end of the day and investors were calm enough to buy in stocks that were sold at low prices, Sài Gòn-Hà Nội Securities (SHS) said in its daily report.

Well-maintained liquidity on Wednesday proves investors are still available and willing to jump in the market whenever a correction starts, SHS said.

“The market sentiment has become better. But there is not much room for further market growth.”

The next test for the VN-Index is 910 points, SHS forecast, adding it may fall back to 880 points in the short term.

On the Hà Nội Stock Exchange, the minor HNX-Index rose 0.46 per cent to end Wednesday at 120.68 points.

The northern market index has rallied a total of nearly 6.20 per cent in the last six trading days.

Nearly 75 million shares were traded on the northern bourse, worth nearly VNĐ779 billion. — VNS