The benchmark index for the Ho Chi Minh City (TP HCM) Stock Exchange opened today's trading session in the green, quickly surpassing 1,660 points. Some securities firms believed this development could signal an end to the consolidation phase, leading to a new uptrend.
However, the initial enthusiasm quickly faded. Shareholders capitalized on the recovery to sell, causing the index to reverse course by mid-morning. The market remained in the red, with the decline steadily widening, at one point dropping over 16 points. The VN-Index closed at 1,649 points, while the VN30 missed its chance to reclaim the 1,900-point level.
Selling dominated the TP HCM Exchange, with over 220 shares closing below their reference prices, nearly three times the number of advancing shares. The large-cap VN30 basket mirrored this trend, with 23 codes declining and only five gaining.
By sector, the securities group faced the most significant correction pressure. All shares in this group closed below their reference prices, with common declines exceeding 2%. VIX and VND led the decline, both losing about 3.7%, closing at 25,000 VND and 19,400 VND respectively.
The real estate sector also saw widespread declines. NLG fell the most, by 3.2%, followed by small-cap codes such as LDG, DXG, HDG, and NBB. Only a few shares in this group bucked the market trend, closing in the green, including VIC, DIG, and DXS. However, their gains did not exceed 1%.
In the banking sector, selling pressure heavily targeted TPB and VPB, both losing over 2% from their reference prices. HDB was a bright spot, serving as a market pillar by rising 2.8% to 31,300 VND. This occurred after news that Sovico registered to sell over 65.6 million HDB shares, aiming to reduce its ownership stake from 11.69% to below 10%, as required by the Law on Credit Institutions.
Today, over 850 million shares were successfully traded on the TP HCM Exchange, marking the highest volume in the past two weeks. The selling pressure pushed the total transaction value above 24,300 billion VND, an increase of nearly 2,000 billion VND from yesterday's session. HPG led in matching order value with 1,570 billion VND, significantly outperforming the second-placed VIX.
Foreign investors extended their net selling streak to 11 consecutive sessions. Today's net withdrawal value reached 650 billion VND, 12 times higher than yesterday. VND became the primary target of foreign net selling, with over 7.2 million shares offloaded. DXG, MBB, and VPB followed as the most heavily sold codes by foreign investors.
In a market bulletin published on 18/11, Dang Nguyet Minh, Head of Research at Dragon Capital, stated that the foreign net selling trend is a factor to monitor, despite domestic capital having absorbed the selling pressure recently.
"Global capital flows into emerging markets generally remain cautious due to relatively attractive returns in developed markets and geopolitical instability, which diminishes the appeal of these markets", the Dragon Capital expert commented. "Additionally, pressure on the Vietnamese dong is increasing due to seasonal factors related to the repatriation of foreign direct investment (FDI) profits."
Phuong Dong
