PetroVietnam Gas (GAS) workers at one of its plants. GAS rose 0.9 per cent on Wednesday. — Photo pvgas.com.vn

HÀ NỘI — Shares continued their gains Tuesday thanks to a strong buying force, supporting the uptrend of indices.

The market benchmark VN-Index on the Hồ Chí Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE) closed Tuesday at 1,268.28 points, up 0.61 per cent or 7.7 points.

Market breadth was negative as 187 stocks gained while 227 decreased during the session. Liquidity stayed high with more than 843.6 million shares traded on the southern bourse, worth VNĐ23.1 trillion (US$998 million).

According to Bảo Việt Securities Co (BVSC), the VN-Index is expected to test the resistance zone of 1,268-1,275 points in the next few sessions.

“However, this zone will keep putting hard pressure on the market when approaching it. Market movements in this period are likely to be dominated by a few large-cap stocks, along with a strong differentiation between stocks in the market,” BVSC said.

“Investors should reduce the proportion of shares in the portfolio to 35-45 per cent of shares.”

“They should take advantage of the market’s uptrend to consider selling and reducing the proportion of the portfolio, especially when the market approaches the resistance zone around 1,268 and 1,300 points,” the firm said.

The VN30-Index gained 0.49 per cent, or 6.46 points, to finish Tuesday's trading at 1,312.68 points. Fourteen of the 30 biggest stocks in the VN30 basket increased while 15 declined.

Among the gainers were Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BID), Bảo Việt Holdings (BVH), FPT Corporation (FPT), PetroVietnam Gas JSC (GAS), Khang Điền House (KDH), Mobile World Group (MWG), Petrolimex (PLX), Vietcombank (VCB), Vietjet (VJC), Vincom Retail (VRE) and Vinamilk (VNM)

On a sector basis, 10 out of 25 sectors rallied including wholesale, insurance, real estate, IT, retail, banking, food and beverages, logistics and construction.

On the negative side, securities, healthcare, energy, agriculture, rubber production, seafood processing, construction material and spare parts all lost.

On the Hà Nội Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index gained by 0.25 per cent to close Tuesday at 296.48 points.

The northern market index had risen 0.9 per cent on Monday.

More than 160.4 million shares were traded on the northern exchange, worth VNĐ3 trillion.

The market closed yesterday as it was a national holiday. — VNS