S.Korean stocks, won tumble on Turkish rout
13/08/2018 08:11
* KOSPI index plunges, foreigners sell
* Korean won weakens versus U.S. dollar
* South Korea bond yields up
* For the midday report, please click urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N1V41EC
Aug 13 (Reuters) - Round-up of South Korean financial
markets:
** South Korea's KOSPI stock index .KS11 closed at its lowest
since May last year as the Turkish crisis also hit Asia's fourth
largest economy. The won dropped as investors fled to safer
havens, while bond yields rose.
** The KOSPI ended down 34.34 points or 1.50 percent at
2,248.45, in line with other Asian countries.
** The won was quoted at 1,133.9 per dollar on the onshore
settlement platform KRW=KFTC , 0.44 percent weaker than its
previous close at 1,128.9, marking the lowest since July 25.
** Most leading KOSPI shares were in the red with top
biopharmaceutical firms Celltrion 068270.KS and Samsung
Biologics 207940.KS down 4.2 pct and 3.9 pct respectively,
following a grim outlook by Goldman Sachs. urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N1V41WB
** The third inter-Korean summit, which will take place next
month in the North Korean capital Pyongyang, boosted steel and
construction shares with exposure to North Korea. Moonbae Steel
008420.KS , which soared as much as 15 percent intraday, ended
up 4.9 percent. urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N1V408W
** South Korean finance minister Kim Dong-yeon said it will
spend $4.4 billion next year on blockchain and AI industries,
noting drones, self-driving cars, automated factories, hydrogen
vehicles and bio-health sectors as the country's growth drivers.
urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nS6N1T000F
** In offshore trading, the won KRW= was quoted at 1,133.95
per U.S. dollar, down 0.42 percent from the previous day, while
in one-year non-deliverable forwards KRWNDFOR= it was being
transacted at 1,117.75 per dollar.
** MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan
.MIAPJ0000PUS was down 1.40 percent, after U.S. stocks ended
the previous session with mild losses MKTS/GLOB . Japanese
stocks .N225 weakened 1.98 percent.
** The KOSPI is down around 7.5 percent so far this year, and
down by 1.86 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 330,544,000 shares and, of the total 898 traded
issues, the number of advancing shares was 83.
** Foreigners were net sellers of 172,309 million won worth of
shares.
** The U.S dollar has risen 6.34 percent against the won this
year. The won's high for the year is 1,053.55 per dollar on
April 2 and low is 1,140.4 on July 19.
** In money and debt markets, September futures on three-year
treasury bonds KTBc1 fell 0.02 points to 108.35.
** The Korean 3-month Certificate of Deposit benchmark rate was
quoted at 1.65 percent, while the benchmark 3-year Korean
treasury bond yielded 2.051 percent, higher than the previous
day's 2.04 percent.
(Reporting by Hayoung Choi; Editing by Sunil Nair)
((hayoung.choi@thomsonreuters.com;))