Vietnamese shares made slight gains on Tuesday morning on financial-banking stocks but liquidity remained modest and signalled a tough trading session in the second half of the day.

The benchmark VN Index on the HCM Stock Exchange gained 0.57 per cent to close at 920.31 points. It fell 0.26 per cent on Monday.

The HNX Index on the Ha Noi Stock Exchange advanced 1.17 per cent to end at 101.94 points, extending its growth from a 0.06 per cent increased on Monday.

More than 78 million shares were traded on the two local exchanges, worth VND1.48 trillion (US$66 million).

The stock market received strong boost from the financial-banking stocks such as Vietcombank (VCB), Vietinbank (CTG), Bank for Investment and Development of Viet Nam (BID) and Asia Commercial Bank (ACB).

Bank stocks increased by between 1.3 per cent and 4.3 per cent.

Energy firms also performed well with good growth of PetroVietnam Gas (GAS) and petrol company Petrolimex (PLX). They gained 4.3 per cent and 2.4 per cent, respectively.

Despite good gains of the leading industries such as banks and energy firms, analysts remained doubtful over the chance of the market to make further progress in the afternoon session as liquidity remained low and indicated poor investor confidence at the moment.

The afternoon session starts at 1pm. – VNS