S.Korean chip shares boost market; won eases on BOK comments

Able C&C Co

24/01/2019 07:45

* KOSPI index rises, foreigners buy most since late-Sept
2018
    * Korean won edges lower against USD
    * South Korea bond yields up
    * For the midday report, please click  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL3N1ZO1HA

    SEOUL, Jan 24 (Reuters) - Round-up of South Korean financial
markets:
    
    ** South Korea's KOSPI stock index  .KS11  rose on Thursday
as foreigners piled into beaten-down shares of the country's
chipmakers. The Korean currency won slid after the nation's
central bank lowered its growth forecast for 2019. Bond yields
rose.
    
    ** South Korea's central bank trimmed its 2019 growth
forecast to a seven-year low while keeping its policy rate
unchanged on Thursday, reinforcing expectations it could stand
pat for some time amid conflicting risks to the economy.
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL3N1ZM1ZX
    
    ** The KOSPI was up 17.25 points or 0.81 percent at
2,145.03, extending its gain to a second day.
    
    ** Even though SK Hynix  000660.KS  posted a poor earnings
result, well below market expectation, foreigners were net
buyers of chip shares in a grand scale, lifting the KOSPI
market, said Lee Kyoung-min, an analyst at Daishin Securities.
    
    ** Foreigners still seem to focus on share price versus
valuation in the semiconductor market, Lee added.
    
    ** South Korean chip giants led gains in the market with
Samsung Electronics Co Ltd  005930.KS  and SK Hynix Inc
 000660.KS  climbing 2.5 percent and 5.5 percent, respectively.
    
    ** The world's second-biggest memory chipmaker, South
Korea's SK Hynix, posted fourth-quarter profit well below market
expectations on Thursday, but its shares rebounded from recent
falls due to hopes the global chip market is nearing the bottom,
analysts said.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL3N1ZL2KL
    
    ** The company flagged a tough first half due to U.S.-China
trade frictions and China's slowing economy, as its
fourth-quarter profit missed market expectations on Thursday.
    
    ** South Korea's biggest carmaker Hyundai Motor  005380.KS ,
the world's No. 5 automaker along with affiliate Kia Motors Corp
 000270.KS , surprised the market on Thursday by swinging to its
first quarterly net loss since at least 2011 as its vehicle
sales skidded in the key China market.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL3N1ZN1I6
    
    ** While the company reported a net loss of 129.8 billion
won ($114.95 million) for the fourth quarter ended in December,
its net profit tumbled 63 percent to 1.5 trillion won, marking
its sixth consecutive annual net profit fall.
    
    ** Hyundai Motor earlier in the day said it signed MoU with
Vietnamese firm Thanh Cong Group to set up a sales joint venture
in Vietnam, adding that it plans to expand production capacity
at the joint venture to 100,000 vehicles by 2020 from current
60,000.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nS6N1ZH002
    
    ** South Korea's cosmetics firm Able C&C Co Ltd  078520.KS 
ended 5.6 percent higher after it announced to acquire 60
percent stake each in two local firms JEA H&B and GM Holdings.
The stake purchases are worth 55.2 billion won ($48.85 million)
for JEA H&B and 40 billion won ($35.40 million) for GM Holdings,
the company added.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nS6N1ZH00B
    
    ** Doosan Infracore Co Ltd  042670.KS  on its website said
on Thursday that it won orders in Chile and Myanmar to supply
construction machinery equipment, adding that its orders from
emerging markets last year were worth 898 billion won ($795.11
million).  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nS6N1ZH00C
    
    ** Hyundai Rotem Co  064350.KS  said in a regulatory filing
just before the market closed that its fourth-quarter operating
profit dropped 807 percent from a year earlier, while it added
that the company's annual operating profit turned red last year.
Hyundai Rotem closed down 1.8 percent.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nS6N1ZH00D
    
    ** The won was quoted at 1,128.6 per dollar on the onshore
settlement platform  KRW=KFTC , 0.12 percent weaker than its
previous close at 1,127.3, snapping gains from the previous
session.
    
    ** "Going forward the Board expects domestic economic growth
to fall slightly short of the path projected in October, but to
sustain a rate that does not diverge significantly from its
potential level due to increased government expenditures for
example," South Korea's central bank said on Thursday.
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nS6N1T0025
    
    ** In offshore trading, the won  KRW=  was quoted at
1,128.12 per U.S. dollar, down 0.24 percent from the previous
day, while in one-year non-deliverable forwards  KRWNDFOR=  it
was being transacted at 1,111.8 per dollar.
    
    ** MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside
Japan  .MIAPJ0000PUS  was up 0.34 percent, after U.S. stocks
ended the previous session with mild gains  MKTS/GLOB . Japanese
stocks  .N225  weakened 0.09 percent. 
    
    ** The KOSPI is up around 4.2 percent so far this year, and
up by 2.51 percent in the previous 30 days.
    
    ** The current price-to-earnings ratio is 12.10, the
dividend yield is 1.28 percent and the market capitalisation is
1,242.04 trillion won.
    
    ** The trading volume during the session on the KOSPI index
 .KS11  was 407,782,000 shares and, of the total traded issues
of 896, the number of advancing shares was 491.
    
    ** Foreigners were net buyers of 495.82 billion won worth of
shares, the most since Sept. 21, 2018.
    
    ** The U.S dollar has risen 1.33 percent against the won
this year. The won's high for the year is 1,113.81 per dollar on
Jan. 11 and the low is 1,133.4 on Jan. 21 2019.
    
    ** In money and debt markets, March futures on three-year
treasury bonds  KTBc1  fell 0.01 points to 109.28.
    
    ** The Korean 3-month Certificate of Deposit benchmark rate
was quoted at 1.86 percent, while the benchmark 3-year Korean
treasury bond yielded 1.81 percent, higher than the previous
day's 1.80 percent.

 (Reporting by Joori Roh; Editing by Shreejay Sinha)
 ((joori.roh@thomsonreuters.com; +82 2 3704 5642; Reuters
Messaging: joori.roh.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))