S.Korean stocks, won rise to multi-week closing highs

SEOUL: Round-up of South Korean financial markets:

South Korea's KOSPI stock index ended trade at a five-week high and the Korean won at a six-week closing high on Monday on strong risk appetite after political tensions eased over the Korean peninsula while upbeat US stocks also lent some support.

At 06:32 GMT, the KOSPI was up 24.67 points, or 1 percent, at 2,484.12.

The won was quoted at 1,065.2 per dollar on the onshore settlement platform, 0.43 percent firmer than its previous close at 1,069.8.

In offshore trading, the won was quoted at 1,064.63 per US dollar, up 0.01 percent from the previous day, while in one-year non-deliverable forwards it was being transacted at 1,055.1 per dollar.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 1.28 percent, after US stocks ended the previous session with gains. Japanese stocks rose 1.65 percent.

The KOSPI is down around 0.3 percent so far this year, and up by 3.04 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 was 384,438,000 shares, and of the total traded issues of 887, the number of advancing shares was 654.

Foreigners were net buyers of 197,701 million won worth of shares.

The U.S dollar has fallen 0.2 percent against the won this year. The won's high for the year is 1,056.67 per dollar on Jan. 14 and low is 1,098.4 on Feb. 6.

In money and debt markets, March futures on three-year treasury bonds held steady at 107.68.

The Korean 3-month Certificate of Deposit benchmark rate was quoted at 1.65 percent, while the benchmark 3-year Korean treasury bond yielded 2.307 percent, higher than the previous day's 2.29 percent.