Vietnamese shares struggled to extend gains yesterday on late buying in large-cap stocks during the near-end period of the session.

The benchmark VN Index on the HCM Stock Exchange rose 0.8 per cent to close at 663.37 points, making a two-day increase of 1.8 per cent.

The HNX Index on the smaller Ha Noi Stock Exchange edged up 0.2 per cent to end at 82.90 points, up 0.7 per cent after the last two sessions.

"Late buying from domestic investors and the decrease of foreign selling were the major factors that helped boost the market," BIDV Securities Co (BSC) wrote in its daily report.

"Investor sentiment also improved after the exchange-traded funds (ETFs) completed re-arranging their investment portfolios last week."

"Those factors helped bolster investor confidence in large-cap stocks and directly drove the market up," BSC said.

Better investor confidence helped lift five of the 10 largest stocks by market capitalisation, including Vietcombank (VCB), the Bank for Investment and Development of Viet Nam (BID), PetroVietnam Gas Corp (GAS), property and retail firm Vingroup JSC (VIC) and consumer goods producer Masan Group (MSN).

VCB rose 2.2 per cent, BID was up 1.3 per cent, GAS and MSN jumped 3.1 per cent and 3.2 per cent, respectively, and VIC edged up 0.7 per cent.

Other blue chips such as dairy firm Vinamilk (VNM) were also boosted after falling 2.2 per cent to near the lowest trading value of the day at VND133,000 per share. VNM closed flat yesterday.

Foreign investors remained as net sellers for a 15th day, recording a net sell value of VND57.37 billion (US$2.57 million) on the two local exchanges yesterday, nearly five-fold the value made on Monday. However, this was much lower than last week's daily average net foreign sell value of nearly VND400 billion.

Yesterday, the Vietnamese central bank cut its daily reference mid-point rate for currency trading between the dong and the US dollar by VND6 to VND21,953 for one US dollar. The reference mid-point rate has been on an upward trend for the last six weeks, hitting the highest value of VND21,959 on Monday.

"Investors should keep watching the changes of the reference mid-point rate closely as the US central bank may increase its interest rate in September – the first rate hike this year – and Viet Nam may have to deal with a trade deficit during the year-end," Bao Viet Securities Co said in a note.

Better investor sentiment also resulted in a rise in market trading liquidity. More than 160 million shares were exchanged yesterday worth VND3.54 trillion, an increase of 22.7 per cent from Monday's trading value.

The Ministry of Industry and Trade increased the retail price of fuel yesterday. RON 92 and E5 bio-fuel increased by VND156 and VND145 to VND16,232 (US72 cents) and VND15,981 per litre, respectively. This was the third consecutive price increase after four decreases so far this year.

Source VNS