Vietnam's stock index stagnant on blue chips failure

Although market liquidity in Vietnamese stock market has improved in recent sessions, the market is forecast to have a short-term difficulty due to the failure of blue chips in supporting the benchmark indices. Shares remained sluggish around the 500-point mark on the bourse in Ho Chi Minh City. Since the beginning of 2013, the VN- Index of the southern Ho Chi Minh City Stock Exchange (HoSE) surpassed the level for ten times, though it often lost the mark shortly afterwards. The VN-Index of HoSE went down 1.25 points, or 0.25 percent, to close at 498.61 points on Friday. During the week, the index gained 1.53 point, or 0.3 percent, from last Friday's closing session. It experienced two ups and three downs in the week, posting the highest level of 502.52 points on Wednesday and the lowest level of 497.07 points on Monday. A total of 72.79 million shares worth 920.795 billion VND (43. 63 million U.S. dollars) changed hands at the HoSE on Friday, a decrease of 46.36 percent in volume and 40.31 percent in value as against Thursday. VN-30 index, the new benchmark index for the HoSE which has been applied since Feb. 6, 2012 to track the 30 leading shares by both market capitalization and liquidity, closed at 556.78 points, down 2.34 points, or 0.42 percent, from the previous trading day. A total of 17.92 million shares were traded, worth 387.7 billion VND (18.37 million U.S. dollars). On the country's northern bourse, Hanoi Stock Exchange, the HNX- Index concluded at 63.29 points, up 0.14 points, or 0.22 percent, on Friday from the previous close. Analysts forecast that the downward trend would continue, but the falls would not be significant. They also said the market was attracting strong cash flows, reflecting investors' expectations of positive movements on the market. After being net-sellers in June, July and August, foreign investors returned to pour their money into the market, injecting 590 billion Vietnamese dong (28 million U.S. dollars) in September and 996 billion Vietnamese dong (47.2 million U.S. dollars) in October. Meanwhile, at the Hanoi bourse, the HNX-Index recorded seven consecutive increasing sessions during the last two weeks. The Hanoi bourse will launch a new set of index, which is expected to be put into operation in December. The HNX-Index then will be replaced by a new benchmark index, the HNXFF-Index, in 2014.