Ahead of Vietnam's stock market's historic milestone, how is the market performing?

Ahead of the historic milestone for Vietnam's stock market, how is the market faring? By Viet Linh, Tuesday, April 7, 2026, 18:02. Only hours remain before FTSE Russell publishes the review results on upgrading the Vietnamese stock market (expected in the early hours of April 8). The moment awaited for years is approaching, and the market is listening in and trading in a subdued mood. Today's session (April 7) closed with the VN-Index inching higher, but trading value was very low, under 15 trillion dong. This marked a record low in more than a year. Liquidity declined sharply, showing investors continuing to stand back and observe. Intraday moves reflected a clear tug-of-war. The VN-Index opened positively, quickly moving past 1,685 points on improving demand. However, profit-taking pressure appeared early, causing the index to reverse and at times fall below the reference before recovering slightly toward the end of the day. In a context of weaker money flow, the VN30 basket continued to play a supportive role. LPB stood out with a 4.1% rise, followed by DGC (+2.3%), SSI (+2.0%), VPB (+1.8%), and VIC (+1.3%). On the downside, selling pressure persisted in HDB (-2.0%), VHM (-1.7%), GAS (-1.5%), and TCB (-1.2%), though declines were not large. The market's real focus was in the stock securities group, the segment expected to benefit directly from the upgrade story as the timeline unfolds. Money inflows appeared to concentrate strongly toward the late afternoon session, pushing many tickers higher. VIX hit the cap at 6.9% with liquidity surging; FTS rose 5.8%, SHS 4.2%, BSI 3.4%; SSI, HCM, VCI, and ORS also rose. Meanwhile, the real estate, oil and gas, and consumer sectors continued to show divergence, mostly hovering around the reference. Some individual stocks like PNJ and GEE faced notable adjustments, but overall the market breadth did not widen significantly. The market now faces an important milestone. In the early hours of April 8 (Vietnam time), FTSE Russell will publish the mid-year assessment results for Vietnam's stock market. This is a key step in determining the upgrade pace, with effectiveness expected from September 2026. At the close, the VN-Index rose by 2.55 points (0.15%), to 1,677.54. The HNX-Index rose by 1.67 points (0.68%), to 246.7. The UpCoM-Index fell by 0.19 points (-0.15%), to 125.64. Foreign investors stepped up net selling to over 780 billion dong, focusing on TCB, MBB, HDB, ACB, SSI. On the buy side, foreign demand appeared in VIC, DGC and several large-cap stocks, but it was not enough to balance the market.