Shares rebound as banks and energy gain, all eyes on virus measures

Bank tellers of Vietinbank (CTG) serve customers. Shares of Vietinbank (CTG) rose 2.4 per cent on Thursday.- Photo courtesy of Vietinbank

The benchmark VN-Index on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE) gained 1.30 per cent to end trading at 801.13 points.

Nearly 189 million shares were traded on the southern bourse, worth VND3.2 trillion (US$138.2 million).

Market breadth was positive with 104 shares falling and 256 gaining.

The VN-Index had lost 2.77 per cent to end Wednesday at 790.84 points.

Vietnam has recorded 48 new COVID-19 cases of the disease since it resurfaced in the community last Saturday, 34 of them in Da Nang.

As of Thursday the nation has had 464 cases, 95 of them active.

Ha Noi, where two men were reported to have contracted COVID-19 since Wednesday, has closed bars and banned crowded events like festivals and fairs from Wednesday night.

The two patients, one a 23-year-old from Nam Tu Liem District and the other a 76-year-old from Tay Ho District, are thought to have contracted the disease in Da Nang, now Vietnam's COVID-19 hotspot.

Investors hoped that drastic action of the Government in the fight against COVID-19 would help curb the pandemic and make investors have faith in the stock market again.

The large-cap VN30-Index, tracking the performance of the 30 largest stocks by market capitalisation and liquidity on HoSE, rose 1.48 per cent to close Thursday at 746.02 points.

In the VN30 basket, notable gainers were insurer Bao Viet Holdings (BVH), FPT Corporation (FPT), steel maker Hoa Phat Group (HPG), Masan Group (MSN), Mobile World Group (MWG), Vinhomes (VHM), Vingroup (VIC), Vinamilk (VNM), Vincom Retail (VRE) and Novaland (NVL).

The banking and energy group outperformed on Thursday and supported the market’s rally with gainers including Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BID), Techcombank (TCB), Military Bank (MBB), Vietinbank (CTG), HDBank (HDB), Vietnam National Petroleum Group (PLX), PVPower (POW) and PetroVietnam Gas JSC (GAS).

According to Thanh Cong Securities Company, the short-term trend of the VN-Index is still unpredictable as investors are quite sensitive to the complicated movements of the COVID-19 outbreak.

“Investors should maintain a safe rate of stocks in their portfolios with 30-40 per cent for medium and long-term goals,” the company said.

On a sector basis, 22 out of 25 sectors on the stock market increased, including insurance, securities, banking, real estate, retail, information and technology, food and beverage, healthcare, mining, rubber production, seafood processing, logistics and construction materials.

On the Ha Noi Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index rose 1.17 per cent to end at 108.10 points.

It had lost 1.04 per cent to end Wednesday at 106.85 points.

Nearly 32.4 million shares were traded on the northern exchange, worth VND283.5 billion.