Securities stocks form market backbone

Stocks of Vietnamese securities firms rallied on Friday after their financial statements were announced, becoming the main support for Vietnam's benchmark VN-Index.

Among the gainers, small caps ORS of Tien Phong Securities, AGR of Agribank Securities, and VDS of Viet Dragon Securities hit their ceiling prices; while large caps SSI of Saigon Securities, VND of VNDirect, VCI of Viet Capital Securities, and HCM of Ho Chi Minh Securities expanded 3.61%, 1.35%, 0.96% and 0.99%, respectively.

However, strong selling pressure on banking, consumer goods, materials and industry groups made the VN-Index, which represents the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE), lose 6.34 points, or 0.6%, to 1.042.91.

The major bourse saw 128 tickers gaining and 247 declining, with over 553 million shares changing hands for VND9.7 trillion ($412.55 million), an increase of VND3.1 trillion from the previous session.

The attraction of large-cap stocks decreased significantly, as the VN30 basket recorded only VND3.5 trillion ($149 million) in trading value.

The cash flow mainly ran into securities and real estate stocks. SSI took the lead in matching value with VND666 billion ($28.3 million), followed by VND, and NVL and DIG of real estate developers Novaland and DIG Corp.

Red covered many stock groups such as banking, manufacturing, aviation, energy and retail. Meanwhile, real estate tickers saw a divergence, with NVL, PDR of Phat Dat Real Estate Development Corp., and VCG of Vinaconex losing; and VIC of Vingroup, KBC of Kinhbac City Development Holding Corp., NLG of Nam Long Group and DXG of Dat Xanh Group gaining.

Foreign investors were net sellers on the HoSE to the tune of nearly VND240 billion ($10.2 million). They mainly net sold SSI while net purchasing HPG of steel maker Hoa Phat.

The HNX-Index on the Hanoi bourse went up 0.31 points to 206.92, while the UpCOM-Index on the unlisted public company market rose 0.14 points to 77.99.