About half of shares on the HCM Stock Exchange lost ground on Dec. 20, causing the VN-Index to decline by 1.44 percent over the course of the session to close at 478.29 points.

The volume also dropped by nearly 10 percent from last week's final session to 67 million shares, worth a total of 1.6 trillion VND (76.2 million USD).

Among leading decliners were property developer Vincom (VIC), insurer Bao Viet Holdings (BVH), Sacombank (STB), PetroVietnam Finance (PVF) and Phu My Fertiliser (DPM).

Shares of VietinBank (CTG) managed to buck the day's trend and pick up over 3.4 percent in value, after its HCM City branch posted 11-month profits of 540 billion VND (25.7 million USD).

Tan Tao Industrial Park (ITA) was the most-active share with 4.9 million traded, following on Dec. 17 announcement that it would buy back over 75,000 shares at face-value, beginning Dec. 21.

On the Hanoi Stock Exchange on Dec. 20, the HNX-Index closed off over 2.5 percent to 116.70 points, with decliners outnumbering advancers by 218-88. Volume totalled 47.2 million shares, worth 920.4 billion VND (43.8 million USD).

Habubank (HBB) saw the heaviest volume, with 5 million shares changing hands, but also posted the steepest decline among blue chips on the northern market on Dec. 20, plunging by 2.36 percent.

Other blue chips to dip included Asia Commercial Bank (ACB) and Petrolimex Petrochemical (PLC)./.