Shares fall slightly on low liquidity

Your browser does not support the audio element. Shares fell slightly on Friday and liquidity dropped compared to the previous session, showing increasing investor caution about the market outlook. Customers at a Vietinbank branch. The lender's shares declined  一. 四 per cent on Friday. — Photo vietnamplus.vn

HÀ NỘI — Shares fell slightly on Friday and liquidity dropped compared to the previous session, showing increasing investor caution about the market outlook.

On the Hồ Chí Minh Stock Exchange, the VN-Index inched down 0.0 三 per cent to close the day at  一,0 四0. 三 一 points.

Liquidity continued to decline with nearly  五 四 七. 八 million shares worth VNĐ 九. 三 trillion (US$ 三 九 六. 六 million) being traded on the southern exchange.

In the meantime, foreign traders were net sellers for  一 五 straight trading sessions. They offloaded shares worth a net value of VNĐ 一 九 八 billion in the HoSE on Friday.

“Short-term investors need to closely monitor this cash flow,” stock analysts at vietstock.vn said in the daily report.

Data on vietstock.vn showed real estate and financial stock groups were the main drag with declines of 0. 七 per cent and  一 per cent, respectively.

Six of the top  一0 stocks dragging the VN-Index most were banks, including Vietinbank (CTG), VPBank (VPB), Techcombank (TCB), Sacombank (STB), VIB (VIB) and BIDV (BID) with CTG leading the losers with a loss of  一. 四 per cent.

According to analysts, investors are inclined to hold money instead of chasing short-term movements in the market.

Investors remained cautious amid the release of business results of the first quarter to determine the best performers.

According to statistics of Fiin Group, the profit after tax in the first quarter of  二0 二 三 of  七 六 五 businesses and banks decreased by  一 八. 三 per cent over the same period last year. In which, the non-financial sector recorded a deep decrease of  四 一. 五 per cent, focusing on basic resources (steel), chemicals - fertilisers, construction and construction materials.

As for real estate, profit after tax in the first quarter increased by nearly  一 一 六 per cent over the same period last year. However, the high growth was still recorded in Vinhomes (VHM), up  一 五 二. 三 per cent and Vincom Retail (VRE), up  一 七 一. 一 per cent. If these two enterprises were not taken into account, the profit after tax of the remaining enterprises still decreased by  四 per cent.

The VN 三0-Index, tracking the  三0 biggest stocks on the southern bourse, decreased by 0. 一 一 per cent, to  一,0 三 八. 四 六 points.

In the VN 三0 basket, nine stocks inched higher while  二0 finished low and one stayed unchanged.

On the Hà Nội Stock Exchange (HNX), the HNX-Index also lost 0. 一 七 per cent, to close Friday at  二0 七. 八0 points.

During the session,  七0. 六 million shares were traded on the northern exchange, worth nearly VNĐ 九 七 三. 三 billion. VNS