Viet Nam's stock market finished lower on Tuesday on strong selling force from both local and foreign investors.

The market benchmark VN-Index on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE) lost 0.79 per cent, to 1,339.84 points. The market's breadth was negative with 126 stocks increasing, while 275 stocks declined.

The VN-Index had lost 0.16 per cent, to close Monday at 1,350.48 points.

Investors poured over VND23.4 trillion (US$1 billion) into the southern bourse, equivalent to a trading volume of nearly 860 million shares.

The VN30-Index, tracking the 30 biggest stocks in market capitalisation on HoSE, posted a loss of 0.85 per cent, to 1,446.22 points.

Of the VN30 basket, four stocks climbed, while 25 slid.

“With the market recovering when hitting the support level of 1,330 points, VN-Index is likely to still move around 1,350 points in the next trading sessions,” said BIDV Securities Co.

Foreign investors net sold VND443.0 billion on HOSE. They were net sellers on HNX with a value of VND16.57 billion.

Banking stocks underwent strong selling pressure until the end of the afternoon trading session. The worst performers in the group included Bank for Investment and Development (BID), Vietinbank (CTG) and Vietcombank (VCB), Military Bank (MBB), Techcombank (TCB), Sacombank (STB) and HDBank (HDB).

Some individual stocks in the large-cap group also suffered losses, such as FPT Group (FPT), Hoa Phat Group (HPG), Khang Dien House (KDH), Phat Dat Real Estate (PDR), Phu Nhuan Jewelry (PNJ), Sabeco (SAB), Vingroup (VIC), Vietjet (VJC) and Vincom Retail (VRE).

The oil and gas group performed well at the end of the session and helped narrow indices’ losses, with gainers including Petrovietnam General Services JSC Corporation (PET), PetroVietnam Drilling & Well Services Corporation (PVD), PV OIL (OIL), Binh Son Refinery (BSR) and PetroVietnam Technical Services Corporation (PVS).

On a sector basis, 17 out of 25 sector indices on the stock market lost ground, including wholesale, real estate, securities, information and technology, healthcare, rubber production, construction materials and logistics.

On the other side, gainers were retail, insurance, oil and gas, seafood production, food and beverage,

On Ha Noi Stock Exchange (HNX), the HNX-Index gained slightly 0.03 per cent, to 358.98 points.

The index had gained 0.25 per cent, to close Monday at 358.87 points.

Nearly 186 million shares were traded on the northern exchange, worth VND3.6 trillion. — VNS