Vietnamese shares advanced on Friday morning, driven by large-cap companies in the VN30 basket.

The benchmark VN Index on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange was up 0.91 per cent to end at 916.18 points.

The southern market index fell 0.74 per cent on Thursday.

The HNX Index on the Ha Noi Stock Exchange gained 0.57 per cent to close at 103.95 points.

The northern market index lost almost two per cent in the previous session.

More than 152.5 million shares were traded on the two local exchanges, worth VND2.52 trillion (US$112 million) in total.

Large-cap stocks were the main driving force as the VN30 Index, which tracks the performance of the 30 largest stocks by market capitalisation, rose 0.76 per cent to close at 894.49 points.

In the VN30 basket, 22 stocks made gains while seven declined.

Among the gainers were construction firm Coteccons (CTD), food and beverage company Masan (MSN), VPBank (VPB), Petrolimex (PLX) and digital retailer Mobile World (MWG).

On the opposite side, oil and gas firms suffered from a drop in global oil prices, including PetroVietnam Gas (GAS) and PetroVietnam Drilling and Well Services (PVD).

The afternoon trading session starts at 1pm. – VNS