A customer carries out a transaction at a branch of Asia Commercial Bank (ACB) in Hà Nội. ACB lost 2 per cent on Monday. Photo courtesy of ACB

HÀ NỘI — Vietnamese shares trimmed early gains on Monday with the VN-Index closing lower as banking stocks came under selling pressure towards the final minutes of trading.

The benchmark VN-Index on the Hồ Chí Minh Stock Exchange edged down 0.04 per cent to close at 1,168.27 points.

It had risen 0.02 per cent last week.

More than 652.7 million shares were traded on the southern bourse, worth VNĐ15.6 trillion (US$673.9 million).

Market breadth was positive with 274 gaining stocks and 183 losers.

After the lunch break, the market fluctuated in a quite negative direction as many banking stocks dropped sharply and pushed the VN-Index down to the reference level.

Asia Commercial Bank (ACB) fell 2 per cent to VNĐ31,800 per share, VPBank (VPB) lost by 1.1 per cent to VNĐ41,350 per share, Vietcombank (VCB) declined by 1.5 per cent to VNĐ95,200 per share and Techcombank (TCB) dropped by 0.9 per cent to VNĐ38,850 per share.

On the opposite side, the oil and gas sector increased, becoming one of the best-performing sectors in Việt Nam on Monday, data on vietstock.vn showed.

Vietnamese oil and gas stocks grew well, including PetroVietnam Gas JSC (GAS), Viet Nam National Petroleum Group (PLX), PetroVietnam Drilling & Well Services Corporation (PVD), PetroVietnam Power Corp (POW), and PetroVietnam Technical Services (PVS).

“The market was moving sideways around 1,168 points. Liquidity increased slightly from the previous session and market breadth was positive, showing that investment cash flow is spreading,” said BIDV Securities Co.

“Foreigners were net sellers on both HoSE and HNX. The VN-Index is likely to consolidate in the range of 1,160-1,200 points in the coming sessions,” said the company.

Foreign investors net sold VNĐ1.25 trillion on HOSE, including PVPower (POW) (VNĐ212.8 billion), Vinamilk (VNM) (VNĐ203.9 billion) and Hòa Phát Group (HPG) (VNĐ171.5 billion). Foreigners were net sellers on the HNX to the tune of VNĐ9.56 billion.

The large-cap tracker VN30-Index gained 0.33 per cent to stay at 1,170 points.

Seventeen of the 30 large-cap stocks in the VN30 basket decreased while 12 climbed.

In the VN-30 basket, Masan Group (MSN) was the biggest decliner with a 2 per cent drop, Vinhomes (VHM), Vietcombank (VCB), VPBank (VPB), Mobile World Group (MWG) and Khang Điền House (KDH) all lost more than 1 per cent.

In contrast, PVPower (POW) maintained its uptrend momentum of a more than 5 per cent increase, PetroVietnam Gas JSC (GAS) advanced 2 per cent, while Novaland (NVL) and The Refrigeration Electrical Engineering Corporation (REE) both climbed 1 per cent.

On the Hà Nội Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index rallied 1.39 per cent to end Monday at 263.42 points.

More than 144.7 million shares were traded on the northern market, worth VNĐ2.1 trillion. — VNS