The Vietnamese stock market ended the week on a negative note with the VN-Index falling for the third day, despite positive news of another rate cut announcement from the central bank.

The market benchmark VN-Index decreased by 1.75 points, or 0.16 per cent, to 1,115.22 points. The bearish trend was caused by sell-off activities from exchange-trade funds (ETFs), as today is the last day for the restructuring of these funds.

Opening the afternoon session, the market welcomed the news that the State Bank of Viet Nam (SBV) decided to lower regulatory interest rates by 0.5 percentage points starting June 19.

The positive news could not lift the index, but helped attract cash flows back into the stock market.

The breadth of the market was negative, with decliners nearly doubling gainers. In particular, 206 stocks on the southern market finished lower, while 120 increased.

Liquidity soared with nearly 1.2 billion shares traded on HoSE, worth more than VND22.4 trillion (US$953.1 million). The trading value jumped by 68.6 per cent over the previous session.

However, the VN30-Index, which tracks the 30 biggest stocks on the southern bourse, finished higher, buoyed by strong gains of some pillar stocks.

Ending the Friday session, the VN30-Index was traded at 1,109.06 points, an increase of 0.49 points, or 0.04 per cent. Up to 20 stocks in the VN30 basket dipped, while eight ticker symbols edged up and two were flat.

On the Ha Noi Stock Exchange (HNX), the northern benchmark HNX-Index also closed the week lower at 228.44 points, a decline of 1.09 points, or 0.47 per cent.

During the trade, investors poured nearly VND2.5 trillion into the market, equal to a trading volume of 153 million shares.

Stocks across all sectors faced selling force. And in the top five stocks influencing the market's downtrend, Sabeco was the biggest loser, down 2.52 per cent. It was followed by Vietinbank (CTG), Vinhomes (VHM), PV Gas (GAS), and Petrolimex (PLX), dropping in a range of 0.88 - 2.87 per cent.

Also weighing on the market, popular stocks like VPBank (VPB), Vietnam Rubber Group (GVR), Vietjet Aviation (VJC), Vincom Retail (VRE), and BIDV (BID) posted great losses.

The market pared losses thanks to the good performance of some large-cap stocks led by Vietcombank (VCB), the largest market-value stock. The bank's shares jumped by 1.45 per cent.

Meanwhile, foreign capital kept running into the market, with a net bought value of VND 442.63 billion on the two exchanges. Especially, they net bought more than VND473.3 billion on HoSE, while net bought VND30.7 billion on HNX. — VNS