Stocks advanced steadily on both national exchanges this morning as investors responded positively to the State Bank of Viet Nam's decision to lower interest rates late last week.

The central bank reduced the cap on deposit interest rates by one point to 8 per cent per year, while the lending rate will be reduced to just 12 per cent per annum from today.

However, investors remained careful on the HCM City Stock Exchange as the VN-Index rose just 0.11 per cent to close at 397.22 points while the VN30 tracking the top 30 shares on the bourse was down 0.13 per cent to 464.63.

Almost 32 million shares, worth VND463.8 billion (US$22.1 million), changed hands by the end of this morning.

Wood processor Duc Long Gia Lai (DLG) and Sai Gon Securities Inc (SSI) were the most active shares on the exchange with each code seeing over 1.5 million shares traded.

DLG increased 4.2 per cent to VND5,000 a share while SSI closed up 2 per cent at VNĐ15,600 each.

On the Hà Nội Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index climbed 0.65 per cent to close at 54.40 points on a turnover of VND220.5 billion ($10.5 million).

Shares of Kim Long Securities (KLS) were the favourite among investors with more than 4 million exchanged by the end of the session. The stocks were traded just below the ceiling price of VND8,200 a share.

Trading will resume at 1pm.