Another tepid market performance

Investors found no reasons to buy-in shares and weak demand pushed stocks down.

Selling pressure particularly rose in speculative stocks which had gained in previous sessions. Mineral stocks Lao Cai Mineral Exploitation & Processing (LCM), Tay Bac Minerals Investment (KTB), Binh Thuan Mineral Industry (KSA), Nari Hamico Minerals (KSS) strongly dropped or even hit the floor.

Speculative stocks in producing sectors Vegetable Oil Packing (VKP), Truong Thanh Furniture Corp. (TTF) sharply fell on locking in profit activities after many rising sessions.

Real estate tickers Tan Tao Investment Industry Corp. (ITA) and Licogi 16 (LCG) stayed unchanged, while Kinh Bac City Development Share Holding Corp. (KBC), Vietnam Electricity Construction (VNE), Development Investment Construction (DIG), Ho Chi Minh City Infrastructure Investment (CII), Khang Dien House Trading and Investment (KDH) modestly lost out.

Among blue-chips, Vinamilk (VNM) and Masan Group (MSN) both strongly declined, PetroVietnam Gas (GAS), PetroVietnam Fertilisers (DPM) and PetroVietnam Drilling and Well Services (PVD) slightly shed.

Banking stocks Vietcombank (VCB) and Vietinbank (CTG) dropped, Military Bank (MBB) slightly lost, while Sacombank (STB) gained.

Almost all active stocks ended down. Just a few stocks still advanced with quite good liquidity, among them Hoang Anh Gia Lai (HAG), Kinh Do Corp (KDC), Cotec investment and Land-House Development (CLG), Bibica Corp. (BBC).

Half the southern bourse turned to red rhythm, namely 138 stocks were off and 62 were up, pushing the benchmark VN-Index down 3.81 points or 1 per cent to 377.9 points. Liquidity reached 22.3 million shares worth VND260.3 billion ($12.5 million).

Hanoi Stock Exchange’s (HNX) top active stocks largely moved sideways. Matching value of those stocks dried out to just a few hundreds of thousand shares.

Saigon-Hanoi Bank (SHB) outperformed with more than 3 million shares matched, followed by Saigon Commercial Real Estate (SCR) with more than 1 million shares matched.

An increase in put-through value helped the southern bourse’ liquidity improving to 18.4 million shares worth VND111.7 billion ($5.4 million)