VN-Index drops over 14 points in week-beginning session

The VN-Index, which represents the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE), decreased 14.08 points or 1.34% to 1,038.4 on Monday, amid short-term profit-taking pressures.

This was the second declining session after three gaining ones, with 159 gainers and 257 losers. More than 988.8 million shares changed hands for over VND16.04 trillion ($677.94 million).

Blue chips had negative impacts on the market as the VN30-Index, which tracks the performance of 30 largest-cap stocks, dropped 13.85 points or 1.3% to 1,050.22.

Among the losers in the VN30 basket were VIC of Vingroup, VHM of real estate developer Vinhomes, and HPG of steel maker Hoa Phat.

The red color covered almost all major groups like real estate, banking, oil and gas, securities, aviation, and retail.

VRE of Vincom Retail and MSN of Masan Group were the main support for the VN-Index, respectively expanding 4.3% and 1.6%.

Some mid-cap banking tickers like EIB of Eximbank, SSB of Southeast Asia Commercial Joint Stock Bank, and SHB of Saigon-Hanoi Bank also helped prevent the benchmark from falling further.

The bright spot in the session came from steel stocks, with POM of Pomina Steel hitting its ceiling price and HSG of Hoa Sen Group up 1.5%. The seafood and coal groups also made good performances.

Foreign investors were net buyers for the 21st session to the tune of VND110 billion ($4.64 million) on the HoSE. They mainly net bought FUEVFVND of ETF DCVFMVN DIAMOND, HPG, STB of Sacombank, and MSB of Maritime Bank.

The HNX-Index on the Hanoi bourse went down 0.75 points to 212.24, while the UpCOM-Index on the unlisted public company market fell 0.07 points to 72.12.