DAISHIN SECURITIES said on the 17th that KT's stock volatility is high due to the hacking incident, but dividend yield is likely to form a floor. It maintained a "Buy" investment opinion and a target price of 74,000 won. KT's closing price the previous day was 51,300 won.
Kim Hee-jae, a DAISHIN SECURITIES researcher, said, "The stock fell after July due to the fading momentum from treasury share purchases and a suspected small-payment hacking incident," but noted, "The treasury share momentum will resume early next year, and although stock volatility is high, the dividend yield will act as a support."
KT's share price turned downward after hitting 58,600 won, the highest since privatization in July. Of this year's 1 trillion won plan for treasury share purchases, 250 billion won has already been spent, erasing the buying momentum, and the small-payment hacking incident early this month has compounded the impact.
Kim said, "In the short term, stock volatility is inevitable until the investigation results come out," but added, "At least 250 billion won in treasury share purchases is scheduled for early next year, so there is a high possibility that buying momentum will form again."
In addition, KT's dividend yield is expected to form the lower bound for the share price. The analysis is that 52,000 won, where the dividend yield reaches 5%, will be the first support level, and 48,000 won, where it reaches 6%, will be the second support level.
Meanwhile, the third-quarter (July–September) results are solid, it noted. Kim estimated that KT will post 6.8 trillion won in revenue and 570 billion won in operating profit for the third quarter. These represent increases of 2% and 23%, respectively, from a year earlier.