Shares fell slightly on Friday and liquidity dropped compared to the previous session, showing increasing investor caution about the market outlook.

On the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange, the VN-Index inched down 0.03 per cent to close the day at 1,040.31 points.

Liquidity continued to decline with nearly 547.8 million shares worth VND9.3 trillion (US$396.6 million) being traded on the southern exchange.

In the meantime, foreign traders were net sellers for 15 straight trading sessions. They offloaded shares worth a net value of VND198 billion in the HoSE on Friday.

“Short-term investors need to closely monitor this cash flow,” stock analysts at vietstock.vn said in the daily report.

Data on vietstock.vn showed real estate and financial stock groups were the main drag with declines of 0.7 per cent and 1 per cent, respectively.

Six of the top 10 stocks dragging the VN-Index most were banks, including Vietinbank (CTG), VPBank (VPB), Techcombank (TCB), Sacombank (STB), VIB (VIB) and BIDV (BID) with CTG leading the losers with a loss of 1.4 per cent.

According to analysts, investors are inclined to hold money instead of chasing short-term movements in the market.

Investors remained cautious amid the release of business results of the first quarter to determine the best performers.

According to statistics of Fiin Group, the profit after tax in the first quarter of 2023 of 765 businesses and banks decreased by 18.3 per cent over the same period last year. In which, the non-financial sector recorded a deep decrease of 41.5 per cent, focusing on basic resources (steel), chemicals - fertilisers, construction and construction materials.

As for real estate, profit after tax in the first quarter increased by nearly 116 per cent over the same period last year. However, the high growth was still recorded in Vinhomes (VHM), up 152.3 per cent and Vincom Retail (VRE), up 171.1 per cent. If these two enterprises were not taken into account, the profit after tax of the remaining enterprises still decreased by 4 per cent.

The VN30-Index, tracking the 30 biggest stocks on the southern bourse, decreased by 0.11 per cent, to 1,038.46 points.

In the VN30 basket, nine stocks inched higher while 20 finished low and one stayed unchanged.

On the Ha Noi Stock Exchange (HNX), the HNX-Index also lost 0.17 per cent, to close Friday at 207.80 points.

During the session, 70.6 million shares were traded on the northern exchange, worth nearly VND973.3 billion. — VNS