Foreign, retail buying push market up
The benchmark Kospi rose 13.41 points, or 0.57 percent, to close at 2,361.67. Trade volume was moderate at 226 million shares worth 4.42 trillion won ($3.88 billion).
Foreign investors turned to buying for the first time in six days, loading 51.4 billion won worth of shares while retail investors net bought 46.8 billion won shares. Institutional investors offloaded 114.4 billion won worth of shares.
The local stock market opened higher, tracking gains on Wall Street overnight. Seo Sang-young, an analyst at Kiwoom Securities, projected the local stock market will remain stable.
By sectors, steel, semiconductor and IT hardware industries were largest winners.
Samsung Electronics rose 1.82 percent to end at 2,352,000 won, and SK Hynix gained 0.45 percent to 66,400 won.
Naver, the operator of Korea’s top Internet portal, shed 1.27 percent to 777,000 won.
Steelmaker Posco grew 4.71 percent to 333,500 won while Hyundai Steel advanced 2.81 percent to 58,600 won.
Automakers traded in negative terrain, with industry leader Hyundai Motor down 0.35 percent to 144,000 won, and its smaller affiliate Kia Motors dipping 0.56 percent to 35,250 won.
The secondary Kosdaq market closed at 642.11, up 7.2 points or 1.13 percent from the previous trading day. The tech heavy market was largely boosted by strong IT and pharmaceutical shares.
Celltrion grew 1.57 percent to 110,200 won and Medytox gained 2.83 percent to 556,000 won.
The local currency closed at 1,137.20 won against the U.S. dollar, up 4.3 won from the previous session’s close.
Bond prices, which move inversely to yields, closed higher. The yield on three-year bonds fell 2.0 basis points and the return on the benchmark five-year government bond declined 1.7 basis points.
BY KIM JEE-HEE, YONHAP [kim.jeehee@joongang.co.kr]
with the Korea JoongAng Daily
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