An investor looks at stock prices on a smartphone at a brokerage in Ho Chi Minh City. - Vietnam News/ANN
HANOI, Oct 11 (Reuters/Vietnam News-ANN): Vietnam's main stock index fell 3.8% to 1,002 points on Tuesday, the lowest level since November 2020.
Traders said shares slumped due to weak global sentiment that prompted them to sell and stay on the sidelines.
Vietnam’s benchmark VN-Index also plummeted by 148 points in September, its biggest decline in 30 months and a steeper drop than most brokerages had forecast.
It has fallen by 24.4% since the end of last year to 1,132 points.
In September, it was among the top 10 worst performing indices in the world.
Foreign investors sold more than VND3 trillion ($125.57 million) worth of securities. The sell-off was more severe than brokerages had predicted.
VNDirect had said that the shortened stock settlement cycle and increased credit quota for some banks would improve the market, and the worst-case scenario was a fall to 1,240 points.
RongViet Securities Corporation even forecast a rise to beyond 1,300 points thanks to the U.S.’s determination to fight inflation.
But the market so far has not share its optimism.
Traders and analysts said money is being pulled out of the market as local banks are raising their deposit interest rates, adding that foreign investors have been net sellers recently following U.S. Federal Reserve rate hikes.
"Domestic investors have reacted to the weak global sentiment (war, recession, inflation) and have been selling, or forced to sell due to margin call," Craig Martin, executive chairman of Vietnam-focused fund manager Dynam Capital, had said last week in an interview with Reuters.
The overnight electronic interbank rate has exceed 8.4% a year, the highest since 2012, according to data from the State Bank of Vietnam, the country's central bank. - Reuters/Vietnam News - ANN
