Bourses crash back to earth

The VN-Index of Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE) sunk 6.37 points, or 1.55 per cent, to 405.02 points.

The benchmark VN30 of HoSE’s blue-chips saw even stronger decline of 6.5 points or 1.4 per cent, ending at 458.23 points.

A mass of blue-chips hit the floor today, among them Hoa Phat Group (HPG), Tan Tao Investment Industry Corp. (ITA), Ocean Group (OGC), Saigon Securities Inc. (SSI), PetroVietnam Finance (PVF). Meanwhile, the HNX-Index of Hanoi Stock Exchange (HNX) lost 1.16 points or 1.82 per cent to end at 62.66 points.

Banking shares sharply lost with Vietcombank (VCB) off 2.38 per cent, Vietinbank (CTG) 3.23 per cent, Eximbank (EIB) 0.3 per cent, after those shares continuously led the gainers in previous sessions.

Meanwhile, continuous news and rumours about the merger and acquisition of banks are still heating the financial market. Local media reported this morning the rumours about the possible merger of Asia Commercial Bank (ACB), Eximbank and Sacombank (STB).

Trading volume of Eximbank (EIB) continued kept strongly high today like it did in some previous sessions, with some 2.4 million shares matched. STB gained, while ACB significantly off.

Among other banking shares, Habubank (HBB) saw 6 million shares matched, while Saigon-Hanoi Bank (SHB) having more than 3 million shares matched.

Of the same movement with HoSE, the HNX saw up to 103 stocks hitting the floor, among them a large part of leading stocks. Some 186 stocks declined on the northern bourse, compared with just 66 up.

The HNX-Index lost 1.13 points or 1.77 per cent to close at 62.69 points.

However, investors still strongly cashed on the market. HoSE saw nearly 50 million shares worth VND704.6 billion ($34 million) changed hands.

HNX saw some 45.7 million shares worth VND344.5 billion ($16.6 million) matched today.