Both stock indices continued to rise on Wednesday morning but their growth slowed down due to divergence of large-cap stocks.

On the HCM Stock Exchange, the VN-Index added 0.3 per cent to end at 687 points. The gauge increased over one per cent on Tuesday.

On the Ha Noi Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index edged up 0.2 per cent to 84.1 points.

Overall market condition was negative with the number of losing stocks outnumbering the gaining ones by 209-157. Another 337 stocks remained unchanged.

Banks were mixed this morning.

Vietinbank (CTG), BIDV (BID), Sacombank (STB) and Eximbank (EIB) on HCM City’s exchange and Asia Commercial Bank (ACB) on Ha Noi’s bourse extended gains of between 0.3-2.4 per cent each.

Vietcombank (VCB), Military Bank (MBB) and Sai Gon-Ha Noi Bank (SHB) slumped.

Many of the top 30 largest shares by market capitalisation and liquidity on the main HCM City bourse also declined and limited the market rise, such as Vinamilk (VNM), Bao Viet Holdings (BVH), Masan Group (MSN) and Hoa Sen Group (HSG).

Liquidity slowed down with just 68.3 million shares worth over VND1.3 trillion (US$57.5 million) traded on the two markets.

The afternoon session starts at 1pm. — VNS