Insurance-finance-banking group Bao Viet's head office in Ha Noi. The company shares gained strongly to boost the VN-Index up on Tuesday morning. — Photo vietnambiz.vn

Vietnamese shares advanced on Tuesday morning, driven by insurance, banking and retail companies.

The benchmark VN-Index on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange inched up 0.23 per cent to close at 998.85 points.

The VN-Index fell 0.13 per cent on Monday.

More than 113.2 million shares were traded on the southern bourse, worth VND2.48 trillion (US$106.6 million).

Large-cap stocks were the main factor that drove the market up, with the large-cap VN30-Index gaining 0.19 per cent to hit 924.66 points.

Boosting the large-cap basket index were insurer Bao Viet Holdings (BVH), HDBank (HDB), Vietcombank (VCB), Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BID) and retailer Mobile World Investment (MWG).

Those stocks bumped the insurance, banking and retail sector indices up between 0.7 per cent and 1.2 per cent, data on vietstock.vn showed.

Despite the growth of large-cap stocks, investors began seeking opportunities in small-cap stocks and pulling the VNSML-Index up 0.37 per cent.

On the Ha Noi Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index was up 0.34 per cent to end at 105.41 points.

The northern market index rose 0.27 per cent on Monday.

Nearly 17 million shares were traded on the northern market, worth VND187.5 billion.

The afternoon trading session starts at 1pm. — VNS