VIC saves market from heavy loss

The day saw 190 stocks inching down and 190 others rising. Some 150 million shares changed hands with a total value of nearly VND3.3 trillion, down slightly in volume but up in value against the last trading session of last week.

Of the total, block deals accounted for 19 million shares, contributing some VND610 billion to the total trade value on the southern exchange.

VIC seemed to rebound from its strong drop in the morning but still ended down 0.09% at VND113,100 per share. Meanwhile, its affiliate VHM fell 2.47% to VND34,000, with matching volume of 2.63 million shares.

Among the large-cap stocks, VCB, GAS, TCB and POW also declined around 1% each.

Meanwhile, lender HDB staged an impressive performance as it surged 3.25% to VND28,600, with foreign investors net buying nearly 680,000 HDB shares, nearly half of the volume of HDB shares transacted.

BID inched up 2.16% to VND35,500 per share and its matching volume totaled 1.4 million shares.

Beverage giant SAB jumped 0.82% to VND246,200. Dairy firm VNM and low-cost carrier VJC also increased 0.22% and 0.09% to VND136,000 and VND113,300, respectively.

The best performer by liquidity was property developer FLC with more than eight million shares matched. It ended down 0.99% at VND5,010 per share, with foreign investors net selling 2.2 million shares.

Construction firm ROS ranked second by liquidity, with 7.17 shared traded. It closed at its reference price of VND31,500.

Steel maker HSG and plastics stock AAA were also among the stocks that took the lead by liquidity, with five million shares changing hands each.

After announcing its business plans for this year, property firm HAG picked up 0.38% at VND5,290 with 4.1 million shares traded.

The HNX-Index dropped 0.55% to 107.11 points, with 28.44 shares worth VND368.92 billion changing hands, down 14% in volume but up 4% in value versus the previous session.

Among the blue chips on the northern bourse, only bank stock SHB gained 1.33% at VND7,600, insurer PVI edged up 0.25% at VND40,000, and port operator PHP rose 6.36% at VND11,700.

Most of the remainder declined. Industrial firm VCS reported the biggest fall of 4.15% at VND64,600.