On the morning of the 12th, the KOSPI is setting a fresh record high for the third straight day.
Overnight, as hopes for rate cuts pushed New York stocks to record highs, Korea's market also gained momentum after easing concerns over the "tightening of the large shareholder standard."
As of 9:13 a.m. that day, the KOSPI was at 3,369.27, up 25.07 points (0.75%) from the previous day. The index opened at 3,374.65, up 0.91% from the previous day.
In the main board, foreigners and institutions showed net buying of 150 billion won and 15 billion won, respectively. Only individuals were net sellers, offloading about 160 billion won.
Among top-cap stocks, Samsung Electronics, the bellwether semiconductor, and SK hynix, which set a new high the day before, were up 2.04% and 5.21%, respectively. LG Energy Solution, Hanwha Aerospace and KB Financial were also gaining.
At the same time, the KOSDAQ was at 840.97, up 6.21 points (0.74%) from the previous day. On the KOSDAQ, individuals and foreigners were net buyers by about 1.5 billion won and 8 billion won, respectively. In contrast, institutions alone were net sellers of about 6.5 billion won.
Seven of the top 10 by market cap were rising. Alteogen, ECOPRO BM, Peptron, PharmaResearch and Ecopro were strong. In contrast, ABL Bio, HLB and Sam Chun Dang Pharm were trading at lower prices than the previous day.
As some concerns over the stock capital gains tax "large shareholder standard" eased, the market appeared to gain strength. President Lee Jae-myung said at a news conference marking the 100th day in office the previous day, regarding the large shareholder standard, "If stock market revitalization would be hindered, there is no need to insist on (the previous government plan)," adding, "I do not necessarily think the 5 billion won threshold must be lowered to 1 billion won."
There was also the impact of all three major indexes on Wall Street ending at record highs overnight. On the 11th (local time) at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), the Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 1.36% from the previous session. The Standard & Poor's (S&P) 500 rose 0.85%, and the Nasdaq composite gained 0.72%.
Although hotter-than-expected inflation raised concerns about stagflation (rising prices amid economic downturn), the possibility of an economic slowdown stood out more than inflation. This is seen as boosting risk appetite on the view that the U.S. Federal Reserve's (Fed) policy path toward rate cuts will not be overturned.
According to the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) FedWatch tool on the 11th (local time), fed funds futures put the probability of a 75-basis-point (1 bp = 0.01 percentage point) rate cut by December at 78.73%. That was up nearly 10 percentage points from 68.1% the previous day.
Meanwhile, the regular rebalancing results for the KOSPI and KOSDAQ large-, mid- and small-cap indexes take effect in the market starting that day. Seven names, including Hanwha, CJ, Hyundai Steel, ISU PETASYS, Kiwoom Securities, LG CNS and APR, will be newly added to the KOSPI large-cap index.