Foreign investors dump 3.8 trillion won, putting KOSPI 5,900 and KOSDAQ 800 levels under threat [fn Afternoon Market Update]

[Financial News] Foreign investors’ net selling of more than 3.8 trillion won on the main board put the KOSPI at risk of falling to the 5,900 level during the session. The KOSDAQ also slid close to 800. Both indexes have rebounded from their lows, but steep declines continue, led by large-cap semiconductor stocks.
As of 2:15 p.m. on the 13th, the KOSPI stood at 6,047.08, down 337.16 points (5.28%) from the previous trading day. During the session, it fell as low as 5,911.11, down 473.13 points (7.41%). It later recovered the 6,000 level but was still down more than 5%.
The KOSDAQ stood at 834.01, down 15.18 points (1.79%) from the previous trading day. Its intraday low was 802.91, a decline of 5.45%, putting the 800 level under threat as well.
Heavy foreign selling continued. At the same time, foreign investors had net sold 3.8766 trillion won worth of shares on the main board. Individual investors net bought 2.0487 trillion won worth, and institutions net bought 1.2904 trillion won worth, but their purchases failed to stem the indexes’ declines.
Among institutional investors, financial investment firms net bought 1.4415 trillion won worth of shares. By contrast, investment trusts net sold 220.3 billion won worth, private equity funds 39.3 billion won worth, and banks 19.8 billion won worth.
Samsung Electronics and SK hynix also remained sharply weaker. At this time, Samsung Electronics was trading at 233,000 won, down 6.99% from the previous trading day. SK hynix stood at 1,466,000 won, down 8.66%.
Earlier, the Korea Exchange triggered a sell-sidecar in the main board market at 9:47 a.m. It was the 50th sidecar in the KOSPI market this year and the 26th in the sell direction. The index fell further even after the measure, which suspends the effectiveness of program sell orders for five minutes.
Kang Jin-hyuk, a senior researcher at Shinhan Securities, said, “Concerns about the profitability of artificial intelligence (AI) investments and the technological catch-up by Chinese memory chipmaker CMXT dampened investor sentiment toward semiconductors.” He added, “The end of Samsung Electronics’ share buyback and the completion of SK hynix’s buyback also acted to weaken the buying base.”

[email protected] Choi Doo-sun Reporter