The stock market on Sept. 27 continued to be affected by gold-related information. Despite a slight drop in domestic gold prices, they remained around 4 million VND (193.2 USD) higher than on the global market, ranging from 45.1 million VND to 45.2 million VND (2,180 USD) per tael (one tael equals 1.2 ounces).

"It means that money is still being poured into gold, increasing the need for dollars and pushing the exchange rate up on the free market," commented Saigon - Hanoi Securities Co's analyst Le Trung Dung.

The State Bank's aim to control exchange rate fluctuation at 1 percent will also be affected, he added.

Meanwhile, the trade deficit in September was estimated at 1 billion USD, while the figure in August was just 395 million USD. "However, this number is not as bad as it may seem, since it was mostly caused by gold imports," stated Viet Capital Securities Co's analysts.

The trade deficit, if gold imports are excluded, was only 400 million USD, representing a 60-percent decrease compared to the same period last year. Analysts also reduced their forecast for this year's deficit from 12 billion USD to 10-11 billion USD.

Shares on the HCM Stock Exchange were back in positive territory at the end
of Sept. 27's session, after a morning of mixed fortunes.

The VN-Index closed up 0.7 percent to finish at 437.47 points.

Market value edged up 8.5 percent from Monday's close to 697.1 billion VND (33.7 million USD), with about 40 million shares changing hands. "The value of trades is an important factor to judge the trend of the market, but it did not improve much," Dung said.

"With the current upheavals of the global economy, investors should give priority to safe investment, buying in when trading is enhanced," he suggested.

Of the 10 leading shares by capitalisation on the southern bourse, insurer Bao Viet Holdings (BVH), which fell to its floor price in the previous session, rose the daily limit of 5 percent to reach 71,500 VND per share. Five other codes managed gains of between 0.3 – 2.4 percent, but the remaining blue chips slumped from 0.6 – 1 percent.

Sacombank (STB) claimed the highest trading volume in HCM City , with 1.9 million shares exchanged.

On the Hanoi Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index lost a further 0.08 percent to finish the session at 73.34 points.

The value of trades rose 32.3 percent against Sept. 26 to 519.4 billion VND (25.1 million USD) on a volume of 46.3 million shares.

Kim Long Securities Co (KLS) was the most active stock nationwide, with 5.8 million shares changing hands.

Foreign investors ended the day as net sellers, offloading combined net of 29.6 billion VND (1.4 million USD) on both bourses./.