Shares on two main stock exchanges finished lower on Wednesday due to rising selling pressure, but losses were capped on foreign capital inflows and gains of some large-cap stocks.

On the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE), the VN-Index ended at the session low of 1,117.42 points, down 5.04 points, or 0.45 per cent.

The index moved close to the resistance level of 1,130 in the early trade, with the number of gainers more than double that of losers. However, it could not keep the bullish trend and dragged down by sell-off activities in the last trading minutes.

Gains in the last three sessions have triggered profit-taking sentiment among some investors.

“The market remains positive and there are some corrections to consolidate the uptrend. So, we think short-term investors still can seize opportunities of the corrections to take profits,” said analyst of Saigon - Hanoi Secutities JSC.

The market’s breadth was in negative territory as 246 stocks declined, while 93 stock inched higher.

Meanwhile, liquidity increased over Tuesday session, of which, the trading value on the southern bourse rose nearly 12 per cent to over VND17.13 trillion (US$728.7 million). The trading volume recorded at nearly 928.6 million shares.

The VN30-Index, tracking the 30 biggest stocks on HoSE, dropped 4.79 points, or 0.43 per cent, to 1,110.6 points.

In the VN30 basket, 17 stocks went down, while 11 ticker symbols performed positively and two finished flat.

Leading the losing trend was Vietnam Rubber Group (GVR), down 2.72 per cent in market cap. It was followed by BIDV (BID), Hoa Phat Group (HPG), Mobile World Investment Corporation (MWG), and Masan Group (MSN). The stocks all fell at least 1 per cent.

Also weighing on the market sentiment, many banking and real estate stocks performed poorly. Popular names in the market like Sacombank (STB), Gelex Group (GEX), Hoa Sen Group (HSG), Novaland (NLG), and DIC Group (DIG) all posted great losses.

However, the benchmark index pared losses thanks to rallies of some pillar stocks, led by Vietinbank (CTG) with an increase of 1.41 per cent. VPBank (VPB), Vinhomes (VHM), PV Gas (GAS) and Sahabank (SHB) also witnessed good performance on Wednesday, up in a range of 0.53-2.45 per cent.

The HNX-Index, representing the northern bourse’s benchmark, also ended the three-day winning streak and close the trading session at 228.91 points, down 1.34 points, or 0.58 per cent.

During the session, nearly 127.3 million shares were traded on the Ha Noi Stock Exchange (HNX), worth more than VND2 trillion.

The market was also cushioned by the inflows of foreign capital. Particularly, foreign investors net bought over VND604 billion on HoSE and VND10.3 billion on HNX. — VNS