Vietnamese shares edged up on Friday morning but liquidity remained low ahead of the national holidays.

The benchmark VN-Index on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange was up 0.25 per cent to close at 976.52 points.

The VN-Index fell 0.29 per cent on Thursday.

More than 57 million shares were traded on the southern bourse, worth VND1.26 trillion (US$54.4 million).

Trading liquidity continued at a low level as investors were unwilling to take part in trading ahead of the national holidays.

The market gains were driven by large-cap shares.

The large-cap VN30-Index, which tracks the 30 largest stocks by market capitalisation, gained 0.29 per cent to end at 888.24 points.

Half of the stocks in the VN30 basket advanced while 10 declined.

Among the gainers were DHG Pharmaceutical JSC (DHG), real estate firm Vincom Retail (VRE), tech group FPT (FPT) and steel producer Hoa Phat (HPG).

Those firms also pushed the pharmaceuticals and healthcare, retail, technology and construction materials sector indices up by between 0.7 per cent and 1 per cent, data on vietstock.vn showed.

On the Ha Noi Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index increased by 0.42 per cent to end at 107.39 points.

The northern market index inched down 0.19 per cent on Thursday.

More than 18 million shares were traded on the northern bourse, worth VND184.6 billion.

The afternoon trading session starts at 1pm. — VNS