Vietnamese shares were mixed on Wednesday as capital was directed into mid-cap and small-cap firms.

The benchmark VN-Index on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange inched down 0.10 per cent to end at 969.31 points.

The VN-Index has lost a total 1.50 per cent since the start of September.

The HNX-Index on the Ha Noi Stock Exchange advanced 0.20 per cent to close at 100.17 points, ending its previous six-day losing streak of total 2.30 per cent.

Nearly 180 million shares were traded on the two local exchanges, worth VND4.1 trillion (US$177 million).

All sub-component indices on both local exchanges increased on Wednesday, proving market sentiment was better.

Le large-cap VN30 and HNX30 were up 0.28 per cent each. Mid-cap and small-cap indices also advanced between 0.09 per cent and 0.59 per cent on the two bourses.

Stronger gains of mid-cap and small-cap indices compared to large-cap indices showed investors were seeking opportunities in smaller companies’ stocks.

The best-performing sector on the market was the building materials industry, whose index gained 2.5 per cent, data on vietstock.vn showed.

Steel stocks drove the sector up including Hoa Phat Group (HPG), Hoa Sen Group (HSG), Pomina (POM) and Tien Len Steel JSC (TLH).

Those companies saw share prices rise after each of them had supportive news.

Hoa Sen Group has announced it will buy back 16,500 shares as treasury shares. The firm's shares rose 2.3 per cent.

Pomina is planning to issue more than 36.3 million shares to pay a dividend to shareholders. Its shares rose 2.4 per cent.

Meanwhile, Hoa Phat shares and Tien Len Steel shares were up 3.5 per cent and 2.7 per cent, respectively.

Local steel firms also benefited from the Ministry of Industry and Trade’s move to investigate the dumping of cheap Chinese steel products into Viet Nam.

Other sectors that also performed well included ancillary, rubber and plastics, wholesale and insurance.

On the negative side, agriculture, healthcare and pharmaceuticals, seafood processing and consumer staple and electrics weighed on the market.

The stock market struggled with the depletion of trading liquidity, Sai Gon- Ha Noi Securities Co (SHS) said in its daily report.

Market breadth was positive, with total 221 gaining stocks against 187 decliners, showing capital has began spreading widely to other sectors, the company said.

There was still chance for the VN-Index to make technical recoveries in the next days, especially when net foreign selling of only VND8 billion had hardly impacted market sentiment, SHS said.

But SHS noted the market would likely move sideways and struggle within the day as there was little supportive news coming to boost market demand, the company added. – VNS