After closing at 1.026,27 points at the end of the morning session, a 6.46 percent or 70-point decrease, the VN-Index continued to plummet on news that authorities have found 82 patients related to the two diagnosed on Thursday morning with Covid-19.

The VN30 for the stock market’s 30 largest caps at the time saw 20 of its tickers hit floor price, and another 10 followed suit by 1.20 p.m., 20 minutes after trading reopened for the afternoon session.

By 1.40 p.m., there were no more buy orders for any of the blue chips, while sell orders for millions of these stocks at their lower circuit await price matches.

The lower circuit is the minimum price to which a stock is allowed to fall within a trading day, which is between 6.8 percent and 7 percent for tickers on the VN30, depending on the individual ticker.

Nearly 40 million ROS shares of construction firm FLC Faros, 14 million HPG of steelmaker Hoa Phat Group, 11.7 million STB of private lender Sacombank, 9.5 million TCB of private lender Techcombank, and 8.5 million SSI of top brokerage SSI Securities Corporation have lined up for buyers.

As of 2.17 p.m., only 19 stocks remained in the green, while 481 were in the red, of which 283 have sunk to their lower trading limit. Total trading volume was at VND16.51 trillion ($714.25 milllion).

The VN-Index, at the time of writing, was down 74.20 points, or 6.76 percent, to 1,022.97 points, the biggest single-session loss ever experienced on the HoSE since it was established in 2001.