Foreign investors bought more Vietnamese stocks than they sold in January, snapping a month-long streak as net buyers after offloading shares in the last five months of 2019.

Foreign investors buy more Vietnamese stocks than they sell in January.
(Photo: VNA) 

The foreign players’ net purchase of equity on Vietnam’s stock exchanges amounted to some 1.97 trillion VND (84.4 million USD) in the month. They transacted more than 20.6 trillion VND worth of Vietnamese shares, accounting for 15.68 percent of the market’s total transactions.

Targeted stocks in the month include PetroVietnam Low Pressure Gas Distribution (PGD), Mobile World Corporation (MWG), Hoa Phat Group (HPG), Vietinbank (CTG), and dairy firm Vinamilk (VNM). Net foreign buys of the five stocks were 1.02 trillion VND, 588 billion VND, 433 billion VND, 170.6 billion VND, and 166 billion VND, respectively.

Becoming net buyers on Vietnamese stock exchanges, foreign players have shown their rising confidence in the nation’s economy and investment opportunities in its stock market, especially in the context of global stock market volatility.

Securities firms have forecast a brighter outlook for the local stock market this year. They said Vietnam would have more opportunities to lure foreign capital on the back of robust economic growth, and the revised securities law which is expected to help upgrade the market’s status.

Experts from the SSI Securities Corporation (SSI) said that foreign trading activities will increase this year thanks to many supporting factors, especially the exchange-traded funds (ETFs).

Besides, the global provider of benchmarks, analytics and data solutions FTSE Russell is considering to upgrade Vietnam to secondary emerging market status from a frontier one. However, Vietnam needs to work more to meet criteria on payment required for its status upgrade.

The benchmark VN-Index on the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange (HOSE), VN Index’s VNX Allshare, and the VN30-Index finished January at 936.62, 816.56 and 848.63 points, decreasing 2.54, 3.43, and 3.46 percent, respectively. The local market was moving sideways with the global market, which is whacked by the novel coronavirus outbreak.