Stocks bounce after global rout, but virus still looms
Stocks recovered some ground Tuesday after a weak start in the morning triggered by heavy losses in the United States and a steep drop in oil prices.Institutional investors and individuals bought shares to balance heavy net selling by foreign investors.
The Dow Jones industrial average sank 7.79 percent on Monday, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq composite index plummeting 7.29 percent.
Huh Jae-hwan, a strategist at Eugene Investment, said the rally was just a technical rebound following the sharp decline the previous session.
The coronavirus, or Covid-19, outbreak has spread beyond China, where it originated, to Korea, Japan, Iran, Europe and the United States.
The virus has infected more than 110,000 people in more than 100 countries and regions, with 3,817 deaths as of 4 p.m. Tuesday, according to the World Health Organization.
In Korea, the coronavirus has killed 54 people, mostly elderly patients with underlying illnesses, and infected more than 7,500 others.
Large-cap stocks were mixed.
Hyundai Motor shed 1.92 percent, SK Telecom was down 0.23 percent and LG Chem inched down 0.13 percent.
Among gainers, Samsung Electronics inched up 0.74 percent, chipmaker SK hynix rose 2.53 percent, Kakao gained 3.28 percent and the country’s online portal operator Naver was up 2.38 percent.
Medical firms were in a positive territory. Celltrion added 4.02 percent, and Samsung BioLogics inched up by 0.40 percent.
The secondary Kosdaq was up 5.37 points, or 0.87 percent, to close at 619.97.
CJ ENM added 0.34 percent, Pearl Abyss, a local game developer, added 4.45 percent, and Studio Dragon, the production house of CJ ENM, added 2.28 percent.
The won was trading at 1,199.60 won against the dollar, up 4.60 won. Bond prices, which move inversely to yields, closed mixed. The yield on three-year bonds added 2.4 basis points to 1.078 percent, and the yield on the benchmark 10-year government bond shed 19.8 basis points to reach 0.56 percent.
BY KANG JAE-EUN, YONHAP [kang.jaeeun@joongang.co.kr]
with the Korea JoongAng Daily
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