South Korean shares rally 6% as SK Hynix beats forecasts
South Korea's benchmark KOSPI climbed 337.64 points, or 5.99%, to 5,975.98 by 0140 GMT on Wednesday, putting the index on course for its biggest daily percentage gain since July 31 as chipmakers led a broad rally.
The trigger was SK Hynix, which gained 8.20% after announcing shareholder returns of about $75 billion and reporting a more than seven-fold rise in quarterly profit. The chipmaker said it expects demand to remain robust as AI infrastructure keeps pushing memory chip prices higher. Peer Samsung Electronics rose 8.90%.
The advance was wide: 620 of the 913 traded issues gained against 257 decliners. Battery maker LG Energy Solution added 1.70%, Hyundai Motor rose 3.27%, sister automaker Kia gained 1.50% and steelmaker POSCO Holdings put on 2.72%, while drugmaker Samsung BioLogics slipped 0.36%. Foreigners were net buyers of shares worth 589.1 billion won ($444.24 million).
The rally followed a higher close on US stocks, where an AI-driven tech advance coincided with the Federal Reserve's penultimate policy meeting of the year. In Korean money and debt markets, the won was quoted at 1,335.7 per dollar on the onshore settlement platform, 0.64% weaker than its previous close of 1,327.2. December futures on three-year treasury bonds lost 0.05 point to 103.29, the most liquid three-year yield fell 2.2 basis points to 3.776% and the benchmark 10-year yield rose 2.8 basis points to 4.070%.
