Stocks rally for second straight day

The local stock market rallied for a second day today, February 12, as several speculative stocks climbed but at a moderate rate.

The VN-Index of the Hochiminh Stock Exchange moved sideways above the reference level before closing at near the intraday low of 937.68 points, up a slight 3.01 points, or 0.32%, against the session earlier. Lender TCB reported nearly 23 million shares were traded in block deals with a total value of VND544.7 billion, thus pushing up the overall turnover of the market by 33% at VND4.2 trillion.

Some of the affiliates of property group FLC rose to their upper limits on high liquidity. ROS shot up to its daily ceiling price of VND9,220 with matching volume of 6.7 million shares while mining firm AMD closed at VND1,870 with 2.6 million shares traded.

Meanwhile, FLC gained just 1.5% at VND4,030 on volume of more than 4.5 million shares. GAB, another affiliate of FLC active in the mining and asset management sectors, jumped 3.1% at VND62,000, even though it came under selloff pressure, having advanced for 17 consecutive sessions.

Banks still led the market by liquidity, with STB remaining the volume leader with 14.7 million shares changing hands. MBB came next with matching volume of 10.9 million shares, followed by CTG with nearly 10.4 million shares.

Bao Viet Securities in a report said the stock market has seen investors remaining in inactive mode since the end of the Lunar New Year holiday because of the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak.

However, the recent sharp falls have led certain investors to search for some of the stocks that had been hit hard. Retail, wholesale, securities, information and technology, oil and gas, banking and rubber production have been the major driving forces in the past two days.

The benchmark VN-Index is seen testing the resistance range of 937 and 943 points in the next session. If successfully penetrating through this range, the index will possibly reach 960 to 965 points in short term. However, it is still too early to say the virus epidemic abates, so investors are advised to be watchful.

“We are leaning toward the possibility that the market will oscillate in the trading range between the supporting range of 920 and 922 and the resistance range of 937 and 943 points,” the brokerage said.

On the Hanoi Stock Exchange, lender ACB soared 8% at VND10,500, driving up the HNX-Index by a massive 3.74 points, or 3.44%, at 108.51. Today marked the biggest single-day rise of the index since July 2018.

The Saigon Times