South Korean shares surge 6% as AI chip rally gathers pace
South Korean shares surge 6% as AI chip rally gathers pace July 22 (Reuters) - Round-up of South Korean financial markets:
** South Korean shares surged 6% in early trading on Wednesday, lifted by heavyweight memory chipmakers as investors returned to AI-linked stocks after a punishing selloff last week.
** The benchmark KOSPI .KS11 was up 406.60 points, or 6.03%, at 7,154.55, as of 0125 GMT. The junior Kosdaq index .KQ11 advanced almost 5%.
** The sharp rally triggered a "sidecar" mechanism on KOSPI, halting programme trading for five minutes.
** The gains tracked a rebound in U.S. markets overnight. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite .IXIC edged higher, while the Philadelphia SE Semiconductor Index .SOX jumped more than 5% for its best session in five weeks.
** Market focus turns to earnings from Google-parent Alphabet GOOGL.O, and chipmakers Intel INTC.O and Texas Instruments TXN.O this week. .N
** On KOSPI, SK Hynix 000660.KS, the world's leading AI memory chipmaker, soared more than 9%, while its rival Samsung Electronics 005930.KS advanced 6.6%, building on their gains from the previous session.
** Hyundai Motor 005380.KS and sister automaker Kia Corp 000270.KS up 7.64% and up 2.97%, respectively. Battery maker LG Energy Solution 373220.KS climbed 3.79%.
** Steelmaker POSCO Holdings 005490.KS added 2.5%, while drugmaker Samsung BioLogics 207940.KS drifted near its previous close.
** Of the total 911 traded issues, 728 shares advanced, while 162 declined. Foreign investors bought a net 1.75 trillion won ($1.18 billion) worth of shares, and have net bought 2.71 trillion won over the past week through Tuesday.
** The won was quoted at 1,480 per U.S. dollar on the onshore settlement platform KRW=KFTC, after rising to as much as 1,471 a dollar the previous day.
** In offshore trading, the won KRW= was quoted at 1,480.0 per dollar, up 0.1% on the day, while in non-deliverable forward trading its one-month contract KRW1MNDFOR= was quoted at 1,478.9.
** In money and debt markets, September futures on three-year Treasury bonds KTBc1 lost 0.09 point to 102.79.
** The most liquid three-year Korean treasury bond yield KR3YT=RR rose by 2.8 basis points to 3.897%, while the benchmark 10-year yield KR10YT=RR rose by 2.8 basis points to 4.359%.
($1 = 1,479.7000 won)
(Reporting by Sameer Manekar in Bengaluru; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips)
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