Shares declined for the second day in a row on both national stock exchanges as investors continued to offload local stocks, especially those of large-cap firms.

The benchmark VN-Index on the HCM Stock Exchange (HOSE) was down 0.8 per cent, at 654.9 points. It slipped 0.7 per cent on Monday.

On the Ha Noi Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index dropped 0.5 per cent to 80.1 points. The gauge slumped 0.9 per cent on Monday.

On Tuesday morning, the Saigon Beer-Alcohol-Beverage Corporation made its debut of 641.28 million shares on HOSE at a reference price of VND110,000 (US$4.85) a share, under the code of SAB. Following on the footsteps of Hanoi Beer Alcohol And Beverage Joint Stock Corporation’s (BHN) successful debut on the Unlisted Public Company Market (UPCoM), Sabeco’s shares hit the daily rise limit of 20 per cent and closed at VND132,000 per share.

However, unlike the BHN listing, which boosted other beer companies, the shares of brewery firms such as Saigon Beer Western (WSB), Sai Gon-Phu Tho Beer (BSP) and Sai Gon-Mien Trung Beer (SMB) all declined between 11 per cent and 13 per cent on the UPCoM.

Large-cap stocks continued their downward spiral, with 25 of the top 30 largest shares by market capitalisation and liquidity on the HOSE losing value. Only four stocks - Bao Viet Holdings (BVH), Masan Group (MSN), FPT Corp (FPT) and PetroVietnam Drilling and Wells Service (PVD) - bucked the trend.

Around 89 million shares worth VND1.3 trillion ($57.3 million) were traded in the two markets.

The afternoon session starts at 1pm. – VNS