Building contractor Viglacera workers pile up tiles. The construction sector was among those that were weighed down by the market caution on Thursday. — Photo nhipcaudautu.vn

Vietnamese shares were mixed on Thursday morning while market trading liquidity was modest as investors were unwilling to open checks for buying in assets.

The benchmark VN-Index on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange inched up 0.15 per cent to close at 979.10 points.

The VN-Index had dropped total 0.66 per cent in the previous two trading days.

The HNX-Index on the Ha Noi Stock Exchange was down 0.08 per cent to end at 100.86 points.

The northern market index has lost total 1.42 per cent since Tuesday.

Nearly 100 million shares were traded on the two local exchanges, worth VND1.74 trillion (US$75 million).

The Vietnamese stock market was quiet as investors still worried about potential risks and they were not ready to make new purchases at the moment, according to VNDirect Securities Corp (VNDS).

Driving the stock market up was the large-cap VN30-Index, which gained 0.17 per cent to end at 888.64 points.

In the VN30 basket, 14 of the 30 largest stocks by market capitalisation and trading liquidity advanced while 12 declined.

Capital also flew into other groups of stocks such as mid-cap and small-cap, proving investors were seeking opportunities to avoid sole concentration on large-cap stocks.

The VNMID-Index and the VNSMALL-Index was up 0.01 per cent and 0.15 per cent, respectively.

Rubber, banking, agriculture, mining and energy, and plastics and chemicals were the well-performing industries.

Meanwhile, food and beverage, retail, pharmaceuticals and healthcare, construction and seafood processing weighed on the stock market.

The afternoon trading session starts at 1pm. — VNS