Concerns about the financial crisis in Europe have calmed the rapidly rising yields on U.S. government bonds, and following the New York Stock Exchange, both the KOSPI and KOSDAQ indices have shown an upward trend in the early trading hours on the 4th.
The KOSPI index showed 3194.53 at 9:05 a.m. on that day, rising by 10.11 points (0.32%) from the previous day. At the same time, the KOSDAQ index recorded 803.02, up 6.21 points (0.78%). It's the first time this month that it has surpassed the 800 mark.
Among the top market cap stocks in the KOSPI market, SK hynix and LG Energy Solution are showing notable increases. Samsung Electronics, Samsung Biologics, and Hanwha Aerospace are in a downturn.
In the KOSDAQ market, stocks including the 'market leader' Alteogen, ECOPRO BM, Peptron, Ecopro, and PharmaResearch are being traded at higher prices than the previous day. LigaChem Biosciences and LEENO Industrial are showing slight declines.
Overnight, the Standard & Poor's 500 index, focusing on large-cap stocks, and the Nasdaq composite index, focusing on technology stocks, rose by 0.5% and 1.02%, respectively. The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended the day slightly down (0.05%). Google avoided a situation where it would have to forcibly sell its Chrome browser, leading to a strong showing for the stock prices of big tech companies, including its parent company Alphabet.
In addition, employment indicators revived hopes for interest rate cuts. According to the July Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) released by the U.S. Department of Labor, job openings at corporations reached 7.18 million, marking the lowest level in 10 months. As the Federal Reserve is paying close attention to the job market, expectations for interest rate cuts have increased ahead of the September Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting.
According to the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) FedWatch Tool, participants in the U.S. federal funds rate (FF) futures market are reflecting a 96.6% probability of a rate cut at the September FOMC meeting, an increase of nearly 8 percentage points in just a week. Yields on 30-year U.S. government bonds, which had previously breached the 5% level, have also fallen to the 4.8% range.
However, with more employment indicators to be released, the domestic stock market is expected to continue a wait-and-see approach. Tonight, the Automatic Data Processing (ADP) national employment report will be released, and the Labor Department's August non-farm payrolls report is expected to be published on the 5th.
Lee Seong-hoon, a researcher at Kiwoom Securities, noted, "As the yields on U.S. government bonds calm and reflect the rebound in technology stock prices, the domestic stock market is expected to start higher; however, ahead of the employment indicators, the trend of a box-bound market is likely to continue."