Kospi recovers past 1,900-mark In one month

As foreign investors have begun purchasing stocks again in one month, South Korea’s benchmark Kospi rose 3.09 percent (57.46 points) on Friday from the previous day, closing at 1,914.53 points. This is the first time in about one month that Kospi rose over the 1900-mark since March 11 (1,908.27 points).

Such a rise was attributed to foreign investors’ purchasing of stocks after they had been consistently selling in the South Korean stock market for 30 days. Foreign investors started to buy stocks as soon as the Kospi market opened on Friday with the total net purchase of 322.6 billion won. Institutional investors too net purchased 237.8 billion won, driving up the benchmark index. For the past 30 trading days from March 5 to April 16, foreigners had been continuously net selling with the total net sales of 14.76 trillion won during the period.

It is unclear such a bullish trend will continue. “Foreigners who had been leaving the market for a long time have returned, but individual investors may show a bearish tendency, creating a back-and-forth situation,” said Kim Hak-kyun, the head of the Shinyoung Securities research center. “Given the profitability decrease of businesses due to COVID-19, the current Kospi figure is not that low. It will be difficult for the index to continue to rise over 2,000.”


yunjung@donga.com