Vietnam stocks fall on late selling, deepening the Feb loss – Feb 28

Vietnam’s stocks turned tails on the last minutes of the final trading session in February, deepening the month loss as investors off-loaded shares on macro issue concerns.

The benchmark VN Index gave up 5.59 points or 1.19% to 461.37. Volume improved to 34.26 million shares traded for VND768.58 billion compared with 28.6 million shares traded for VND654.64 billion last Friday.

For the month, market lost 49.23 points or 9.64% with an average daily trading volume of 36.24 million, slightly lower than 36.6 million a day in January.

Investors sold heavily in February as the government is taking a package of measures to tackle rising inflation, high interest rates and big trade deficit including 8.5% dong devaluation decision, lower targets for credit growth, M2, state budget deficit.

Though the government has sent the massage and took some bold measures to cope with macro issues, analysts said it will take time for the policy to translate into improvement.

Headlines showed that further tightening measures are likely to come, including higher reserve requirement for banks.

Le Xuan Nghia, Vice Chairman of The National Financial Supervisory Commission suggested raising dollar reserve requirement ratio to 10% from current 3% to stabilize exchange rate.

Despite the possibility of some rallies this week, analysts advise traders to stay on the sidelines saying that the current price level is only attractive for medium and long term investors and the correction is not yet over.

Some technicals say if 460 is broken down, the next target could be 440 or even 420.

Analysts expect macro conditions to start improve from April, supporting the performance of the stock market then.

In related news, local gold prices were firm though global gold price rose in Asia trade this morning. As of 16:00 local time, gold was traded at VND37.52 million and VND37.64 million for bid and ask, respectively. Dollar in the free market eased, losing VND22,000 threshold to be sold at VND21,950.

The market opened with a small gain of 0.16 point or 0.03% with only 0.8 million shares traded. The efforts to boost the market in the early trade was fast and strong, sending VN Index to 474.22, up 7.26 point or 1.5% just 30 minutes after the open, heavy-weighed blue chips provided key support.

However, market failed to gather enough steam to keep heat, blue chips such as BVH, PVF, KBC could not hold gain. The failure of 470 resistance test led to the rising selling pressure, investors took the last 15 single price bidding session as the chance to cash out, sending index to deep under the ground.

The market breadth was negative, losers outweighed gianers by a ratio of 160 to 73 and 52 stocks unchanged. As many as 22 stocks closed down 5% limit while 11 others gained 5% cap.

SSI was the most active stock on the bourse with 2.3 million shares traded, closing down 3.17% to VND24,400.

CTG ranked second in the list with 2.28 million shares traded of which foreigners bought 1.94 million shares, helping its price hit the ceiling of VND26,500.

ITA was in the third place with 1.4 million shares traded, closing down 4% at VND14,600.

ITC and REE followed in the list with 1 million shares and 0.7 million shares traded, respectively.

Foreigners today net-bought VND17.16 billion of local stocks.

On the Hanoi Stock Exchange, the HNX lost 1.44 points or 1.47% to settle at 95.92. Volume stayed at 24.2 million shares traded for VND398.34 billion compared with 24.5 million shares traded for VND387.63 billion last Friday.

The market recorded 100 gainers, 181 losers and 44 unchanged stocks. As many as 17 stocks closed at upper limits while 24 others closed at the lower limits, the trading band on this bourse is 7% both sides.

KLS was the most active stock on the bourse with 2.23 million shares traded, closing up 0.8% to VND13,400.

PVX ranked second in the list with 2 million shares traded, closing up 1% at VND17,900.

VND was in the third place with 1.7 million shares traded, closing up 0.6% to VND16,300.

Foreigners net-bought on this bourse with a net value of VND6.37 billion – Stoxplus.com

Tags: vietnam stock, Vietnam stock market, Vietnam stock news