HÀ NỘI — Shares plunged on Thursday on the two national stock exchanges as negative information continued to weigh on the real estate group.

On the Hồ Chí Minh Stock Exchange, the VN-Index decreased 0.96 per cent after a brief recovery on Wednesday, closing the trade at 1,496.05 points. The southern market’s index declined for four out of the last five sessions.

On the Hà Nội Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index dropped for four days in a row, falling 2.71 per cent to end at 460.83 points. The northern market’s index has lost nearly 7 per cent this week.

Liquidity also declined strongly with more than 1.1 billion shares worth over VNĐ34.4 trillion (US$1.5 billion) traded in the two markets, down 15 per cent in both volume and value compared to Wednesday’s levels.

Realty stocks continued to suffer huge selling pressure.

The “super hot” shares in recent times dropped to the floor price with no buyers, such as Năm Bảy Bảy Investment Corp (NBB), Hồ Chí Minh Infrastructure Investment (CII), Tân Tạo Investment and Industry (ITA), Sài Gòn Thương Tín Real Estate (SCR), Đất Xanh Group (DXG), Development Investment Construction (DIG), IDJ Investment (IDJ), IDICO Corp (IDC) and Licogi 14 (L14).

Slumps of the realty group were attributable to the “scandal” of property developer Tân Hoàng Minh Group reportedly dropping the land plot purchase that it successfully bid at a record price of VNĐ24.5 trillion ($1.08 billion) in Thủ Thiêm Peninsula in HCM City.

Meanwhile, shares under the FLC umbrella such as FLC Group (FLC), FLC Faros Construction (ROS), FLC Stone Mining and Investment (AMD), HAI Agrochem (HAI) and CFS Investment and Import Export Trading (KLF) also hit the floor for several days, of which ROS was locked at the floor for four days in a row, falling from VNĐ16,000 per share to VNĐ14,000 each.

The Hồ Chí Minh Stock Exchange decided to cancel the entire transaction involving the undisclosed sale of 74.8 million FLC shares by its chairman Trịnh Văn Quyết on January 10.

At the price of VNĐ21,000-VNĐ24,000 per share, the record “underground” transaction was valued at approximately VNĐ1.6-VNĐ1.8 trillion.

According to Đỗ Bảo Ngọc, deputy general director of Vietnam Construction Securities Co (CSI), despite the floor prices for several sessions, the price level of many realty shares is still by far beyond their value.

“When investors realise their expectations are too high and the profit-taking selling pressure is increasing robustly, speculative realty stocks will likely fall further if there is no supportive information,” Ngọc said.

He predicted that the upcoming cash flow may shift to the stocks such as banking, technology and retail which are expected to disclose positive business results in the fourth quarter. — VNS