Shares managed to rebound on July 31 on low liquidity as investors feared a bulltrap in the afternoon session.

After gains from large-cap stocks pulled the VN-Index to exceed 590 points in the morning trading session, investors entered the afternoon session with caution. Trading was slow as many expected a sell-off to occur.

However, the selling pressure was not strong and investors boosted buying activities during the last trading minutes. The VN-Index ended 6.74 points higher or as much as 1.14 percent to 596.07 points.

The VN30-Index, tracking the southern bourse's largest stocks by capitalisation and liquidity, was seen rising 1.27 percent to 637.04 points, greatly helped sustain the index's gain.

In the VN30 package, only Hoa Sen Group (HSG) posted losses while three others closed flat.

Big gainers included PetroVietnam Drilling Corporation (PVD) rising 3.8 percent, Hoa Phat Group (HPG) up 4.5 percent and Bao Viet Holdings up 2.9 percent.

On the southern bourse, overall, advancers overwhelmed decliners by 174 to 60.

A modest 64.6 million shares were changing hands, worth 1.24 trillion VND (56.3 million USD).

On Hanoi Exchange, the HNX-Index added 1.25 percent to end at 79.26 points and the HNXFF-Index, composed of stocks with minimum free float rate of 5 percent, rose by 1.22 percent to land at 79.02 points.

Large-cap stocks also played a significant role in the gains of the northern benchmark indices with the HNX30-Index adding 1.8 percent to close at 158.41 points.

With 28.4 million shares changing hands, the trading value reached 364.2 billion VND (16.5 million USD).

According to FPT Securities, the low trading volumes and values on both bourses, coupled with the reliance of the market's gains on large-cap stocks, showed that a large number of doubtful investors remained cautious.

FPT Securities said that July 31 gains did not show a solid uptrend actually, adding that risks remained at high level.

While the market lacked supportive macro-economic information and corporate earnings seemed not to have greatly impacted the market, the company said that it did not expect a breakthrough, especially when foreign investors returned to net selling from the previous trading session.

Foreign investors sold a net 777,690 shares on both bourses on July 31 on a marginal value of 21.98 billion VND (1.03 million USD), 95.4 percent lower than the previous trading session, however.-VNA