Shares rose on both national stock exchanges on July 17 on falling market liquidity, as investors were more cautious after July 16 sell-offs.

The VN-Index on the Hochiminh Stock Exchange added 0.12 percent to 590.37 points while the HNX-Index on the northern bourse advanced 0.86 percent to 80.85 points.

Trading slowed down on July 17, on high selling pressure after two bullish sessions.

The trading volume and value on the northern bourse decreased by 30 percent and 36 percent over previous trading respectively to 96 million shares and 1.4 trillion VND (66.7 million USD).

More than 41 million shares were traded on the northern bourse, worth 541 billion VND (25.7 million USD), falling respectively 40 percent and 32 percent over July 16.

The selling pressure even dragged down the VN-Index to 586 points in the afternoon session as the index did not receive as much support from market pillar Masan Group (MSN) as it did in the morning.

However, the index strongly rebounded when approaching the strong support band, when the market technically witnessed a recovery of buying activities, to close yesterday's session higher.

According to FPT Securities, the market was expected to be on an upward trend to regain its previous peak in March.

But gains on July 17 were reduced by large-cap stocks with the VN30-Index, composed of the southern bourse's largest stocks by capitalisation and liquidity, sliding 0.13 percent to 636.3 points.

HCM City Infrastructure Investment Corporation (CII), Da Nang Rubber Corporation (DRC) and Hoa Phat Group (HPG) were among 12 gainers.-VNA