South Korea stocks rise in volatile trading, retail investors pour in

SEOUL: Round-up of South Korean financial markets:

South Korean shares jumped to an all-time high on Monday as retail investors scooped up stocks at a record pace on fears of missing out on the steepest rally in years.

Trading, however, was volatile as foreign investors focused on cashing out from the index, which has risen 9.39% so far this year and gained 20.4% in the previous 30 trading sessions.

The Korean won weakened, while the benchmark bond yield fell.

By 0218 GMT, the benchmark KOSPI rose 3.78 points, or 0.12%, to 3,156.10, after the index surged as much as 3.6% to a record high early in the morning.

Foreigners were net sellers of 530.5 billion won ($483.06 million) worth of shares on the main board. Retail investors net purchased more than 2.6 trillion won worth of shares by midday, on track to mark the biggest daily net purchase amount.

There seems to be some panic buying from retail investors who fear missing out on the rally, says Na Jeong-hwan, an analyst at DS Investment.

Investors later this week will also look out for the Bank of Korea rate decision as well as the release of the Beige Book (Commentary on Current Economic Conditions) by the US Federal Reserve, he said.

Shares of Samsung Electronics were up 3.7%, having surged more than 9% earlier in the session, while shares of Hyundai Motor were up 8.5%.

The won was quoted at 1,097.7 per dollar on the onshore settlement platform, 0.72% lower than its previous close at 1,089.8.

In offshore trading, the won was quoted at 1,098.0 per dollar, down 0.5% from the previous day, while in non-deliverable forward trading its one-month contract was quoted at 1,098.3.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 2.32%,.

The KOSPI trading volume index was at 968.55 million shares. Of the total traded issues of 905, the number of advancing shares was 129.

The won has lost 1.0% against the dollar so far this year.

In money and debt markets, March futures on three-year treasury bonds rose 0.03 points to 111.55.

The most liquid 3-year Korean treasury bond yield rose by 0.1 basis points to 0.981%, while the benchmark 10-year yield fell by 1.8 basis points to 1.715%.