Property stock rally helps VN-Index close in green

The benchmark VN-Index, which represents the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE), rose 2.41 points, or 0.24% to 1,027.18 on Monday thanks to the rally of real estate stocks.

The major bourse saw 222 gainers, including 17 hitting their ceiling prices, and 153 losers, with nearly 422 million shares traded for over VND6.81 trillion ($277.76 million), an increase of 13.5% from the previous session on March 3.

The VN30 index, which tracks the performance of the 30 largest cap stocks, inched up 0.91 points, or 0.09%, to 1,014.26, with 17 tickers rising.

Real estate became the focus of attention, with almost all codes making strong gains right from the beginning of the session. Among the blue chips, NVL of Novaland and PDR of Phat Dat Real Estate hit their ceiling prices, and VHM of Vinhomes expanded by nearly 3%.

In the mid-cap group, DIG of DIG Corp., SCR of Saigon Thuong Tin Real Estate, DXG of Dat Xanh Group, and HQC of Hoang Quan Corp. also closed in purple.

The rally of property tickers was attributed to a new government decree on corporate bond private placements which came into force on Sunday, and many banks’ moves to reduce interest rates.

The other groups, including banking, securities, steel and construction, strongly increased in the morning but narrowed their gains in the afternoon under strong selling pressure.

Foreign investors continued to be net sellers for the 14th consecutive session to the tune of over VND100 billion ($4.22 million) on the HoSE.

The HNX-Index on the Hanoi bourse went up 1.67 points to 206.56, while the UpCOM-Index on the unlisted public company market rose 0.2 points to close at 76.

Decree 08, effective from March 5, specifies many new points about responsibilities of bond issuers. It allows extending the term of bonds by up to two years, while issuers cannot do so at all under the old Decree 65.

In case bondholders do not agree to such a change, issuers "must negotiate with the bondholders to ensure the latter's interests". If negotiations do not reach expected results, issuers must fulfill their obligations to bondholders according to their previously announced bond issuance plan.

For bonds offered domestically, if issuers cannot fully and timely pay principal and interest in Vietnamese dong according to the previously announced plan, they can negotiate with bondholders to pay with other assets.

The newly-issued decree also suspends the Decree 65 regulation on defining individuals' status as "professional securities investors".

According to the old rule, in order to buy private placement corporate bonds, individual investors need to hold a securities portfolio, excluding margin loan value, worth at least VND2 billion ($84,300) in 180 days.

The old rule that required bond distribution time to not exceed 30 days since the announcement of the offering is no longer in effect, until December 31, 2023. This allows issuers to have more time to find investors, increasing the likelihood of success for the offering.