How to read a stock price board (the complete guide)

How to read a stock price board

Search Google for stock investors and the first image you will probably see is people sitting in front of an electronic screen full of green and red numbers “dancing” non-stop. That screen is the stock price board, which shows the prices and the buying and selling activity of investors in each trading session.

Price boards are usually provided by brokerage firms, which take their data directly from the stock exchanges. Different price boards may look slightly different, but the main information is generally the same. Being able to read and understand the information on a price board helps investors keep track of what is happening in the market so they can analyse it and make sound decisions.

In this article, we will go through the most basic information on a stock price board and how to read it. You can pull up any price board as an example by searching Google for “Vietnam stock price board” and choosing one of the top results.

How to read the price board for stocks (underlying securities)

Ticker (stock code)

The first information shown on the price board is the list of tickers of listed companies trading on the market. Each listed company is assigned its own code by the State Securities Commission of Vietnam (SSC), usually an abbreviation of the company’s name.

Most new investors (known locally as “F0”) will not know many tickers, but over time, with study and in-depth research, you will come to recognise many of them, especially those of large companies. Tickers on the price board are sorted alphabetically so investors can follow and find them easily.

Reference price (Ref)

The reference price is the basis for calculating the ceiling and floor prices, and for determining how much a stock has risen or fallen during the day on the price board. The reference price is the closing price of the previous trading session (on HOSE and HNX), or the weighted average price of the previous session (on UPCoM).

On price boards, prices below the reference price are shown in red, while prices above it are shown in green.

Ceiling price

This is the highest price at which you can place a buy or sell order during the trading day. On the price board, it is shown in purple. The ceiling price is 7%, 10% and 15% above the reference price on HOSE, HNX and UPCoM respectively.

Floor price

This is the lowest price at which investors can place a buy or sell order during the trading day. On the price board, it is shown in light blue. The floor price is 7%, 10% and 15% below the reference price on HOSE, HNX and UPCoM respectively.

Trading volume

This is the total number of shares matched in a trading session, which tells investors how liquid the stock is.

Trading value

This is the total value of all shares matched in that trading session. Trading value equals trading volume multiplied by the session’s average share price.

What is the bid side (pending buy orders)?

Each price board usually has 3 bid columns showing the pending buy orders placed on the exchange. Each column contains a bid price (price 1, price 2, price 3) and bid volume (Vol 1, Vol 2, Vol 3), sorted by priority, with the highest price as price 1. The system shows the 3 highest bid prices and the total volume at each price.

Under the matching priority rules, orders are ranked by price, so buy orders at higher prices always take priority over buy orders at lower prices.

For example, in the sample image, for ACB stock: price 1 is VND 31,600, meaning that among all pending buy orders, the highest bid is VND 31,600. If someone wants to sell ACB and have the order matched immediately, they have to sell at VND 31,600.

What is the ask side (pending sell orders)?

As with the bid side, the ask side has 3 sub-columns showing the pending sell orders placed on the exchange. Each column contains a price (price 1, price 2, price 3) and volume (Vol 1, Vol 2, Vol 3), sorted by priority, with the lowest price as price 1. Under the matching priority rules, orders are ranked by price, so sell orders at lower prices always take priority over sell orders at higher prices.

For example, in the sample image, for ACB stock: price 1 is VND 31,650, meaning that among all pending sell orders, the lowest ask is VND 31,650. If someone wants to buy ACB and have the order matched immediately, they have to buy at VND 31,650.

Clearly, pending bid prices are always lower than pending ask prices, because any higher bid or lower ask would be matched immediately.

Matched orders

This column sits between the bid and ask columns and shows the most recent matched trade in the session. It has 3 sub-columns: price, matched volume, and the price change from the reference price.

Session high (High)

The highest matched price in the session (not necessarily the ceiling price).

Session low (Low)

The lowest matched price in the session (not necessarily the floor price).

Average price (Avg)

The average price at which the stock was matched during that day’s session.

Foreign investors

This column shows the trading volume of foreign investors. It has two sub-columns: “Buy” shows the volume bought, and “Sell” shows the volume sold.

The odd-lot price board

When trading on HNX, where the board lot is 100 shares, investors often end up with an odd number of shares after receiving a stock dividend. To trade these odd lots, HNX has a separate price board for odd-lot trading. You can see VDSC’s odd-lot price board here.

How to read the futures price board

Vietnam currently has two main derivative products traded on the exchange: VN30 index futures contracts and covered warrants (CW).

The futures price board shares several elements with the stock price board, such as the reference price, ceiling and floor prices, and the bid, ask and matched columns. They all have the same meaning as described above. However, the board also shows some basic information about the characteristics of futures contracts.

Expiry date

The date on which the futures contract expires and can no longer be traded. Investors still holding the contract then have their profit or loss settled.

Basis

The difference between the current futures price and the price of the underlying asset (here, the VN30 index).

Open interest (OI)

The total number of long (or short) positions open in the market. By definition, when someone buys 1 contract, someone else must sell them that contract, so total long positions across the market always equal total short positions.

If an investor starts trading and goes long 2 contracts, they have an “open” long position of 2.

If they then go short those 2 contracts, their whole position is “closed” and their net position is zero. Open interest equals the total open long positions of all investors in the market.

Open interest tells us how much participation there is in the market. Low open interest shows that investors hold small net positions, meaning the market as a whole is not holding many positions.

How to read the covered warrant (CW) price board

The covered warrant price board has similar features to the 2 price boards just described. There are, however, some differences I want to highlight.

Warrant code

Looking at the warrant code in the first column, we can see it consists of 8 characters: C + XXX + YY + ZZ. XXX is the ticker of the underlying stock, YY is the last two digits of the year of issue, and ZZ is the warrant’s issue number in that year. For example, CHPG2102 is a covered warrant on HPG stock issued in 2021, and it is the 2nd warrant issue of that year.

Issuer

The brokerage firm that issues the warrant. The firms that issue the most warrants include HSC, KIS and SSI.

Underlying price

The current market price of the underlying stock used as the warrant’s underlying asset.

Break-even point

This is the minimum price of the underlying stock at which the investor breaks even when exercising the warrant. It is calculated from the warrant price, the underlying price and the conversion ratio.

Happy trading!

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