VPBank's employees wearing masks during transaction hours. The bank shares jumped more than 4 per cent yesterday, supporting the market's rally trend. — Photo courtesy VPBank

HÀ NỘI — The market reversed course in Thursday afternoon's trade as investors' risk appetite returned to bank and material stocks. 

On the Hồ Chí Minh Stock Exchange (HoSE), the market benchmark VN-Index surged 1.09 per cent, or 14.01 points, to 1,293.92 points, claiming back most of the losses from the morning trade and Wednesday. In the morning session, the index fell 0.06 per cent after posting a drop of 1.34 per cent in Wednesday's trade. 

The market's breadth was positive as 287 stocks rose while 82 declined. The liquidity, however, was lower than the day before with 439.9 million shares traded on the southern bourse, worth over VNĐ15.1 trillion (US$1.22 billion).

The index's recovery was mainly thanks to large-cap stocks, especially bank and material stocks, as investors' risk appetite returned to the market. The VN30-Index, which tracks 30 biggest stocks in market capitalisation on HoSE, climbed 1.42 per cent to 1,430.29 points. 

Of the VN30 basket, 20 stocks surged while eight slid and two ended flat. 

Material stocks led the market's rally trend yesterday, with Hòa Phát Group the biggest gainer, up 3.33 per cent. It was followed by VPBank, Vietinbank and Vietnam Rubber Group (GVR). All these stocks surged more than 2 per cent. 

Other stocks with big gains were Techcombank (TCB), Asia Commercial JSC (ACB) and SeABank (SSB).

However, the gain was capped by losses in some stocks, especially real estate stocks like Vingroup (VIC) and Investment And Industrial Development Corporation (BCM).

Analysts from Saigon - Hanoi Securities JSC (SHS) said that investors, who made the bottom purchases at the psychological level of 1,300 points on July 12, should continue to watch the market in coming sessions and may increase stock proportion in their portfolios if the benchmark falls back to the support level of 1,260 points. 

On the Hà Nội Stock Exchange (HNX), the HNX-Index also jumped 3.19 per cent to 306.3 points on bullish sentiment. 

During the session, more than 118.26 million shares were traded on the northern bourse, worth nearly VNĐ2.7 trillion.

Meanwhile, foreign investors were net buyers on both exchanges with a total value of VNĐ726.45 billion. Of which, they net bought a value of VNĐ728.11 billion, while net sold a value of VNĐ1.66 billion. — VNS