Kospi and Kosdaq figures are displayed at the dealing room of Hana Bank's headquarters in Seoul on Wednesday. The Kospi is staging an early rebound following Tuesday's sharp selloff, rising 1 to 2 percent in early trade. As of 9:01 a.m., the index was up 104.69 points, or 1.74 percent, at 6,128.35. [Yonhap]
Kospi and Kosdaq figures are displayed at the dealing room of Hana Bank's headquarters in Seoul on Wednesday. The Kospi is staging an early rebound following Tuesday's sharp selloff, rising 1 to 2 percent in early trade. As of 9:01 a.m., the index was up 104.69 points, or 1.74 percent, at 6,128.35. [Yonhap]

The Kospi is rebounding in early trade Wednesday after plunging more than 10 percent and briefly breaking below the 6,000 mark during Tuesday's session. Both foreign and institutional investors turned net buyers, lifting the index more than 1 percent at the open. However, the recovery remains limited given the scale of Tuesday's losses and SK Hynix's second-quarter earnings falling short of market expectations.

As of 10 a.m., the Kospi stood at 6,089.73, up 66.07 points, or 1.10 percent, from the previous session, according to Korea Exchange. The index opened at 6,089.11, a gain of 65.45 points, or 1.09 percent, and has held its gains since.

At the same time on the Kospi market, institutions and foreign investors were net buyers of 844.6 billion won ($576 million) and 238.6 billion won, respectively, while retail investors were net sellers of 1.09 trillion won. Institutional demand, combined with foreign investors reversing course after three consecutive sessions of net selling through Tuesday, is driving the index higher.

Among top semiconductor stocks by market capitalization, the picture was mixed. Samsung Electronics opened up more than 2 percent and extended its gains to more than 4 percent in early trade, posting a clear rebound.

SK Hynix, which released its second-quarter results Wednesday, has been swinging between gains and losses during the session. The stock opened at 1.567 million won, up 1.10 percent from Tuesday's closing price of 1.55 million won, and briefly climbed as much as 3 percent before giving back most of those gains. As of 10 a.m., the share price was down 0.32 percent from the previous session at 1.545 million won — still about 40 percent below the peak recorded last month.

SK Hynix reported second-quarter operating profit of 60.54 trillion won, up 557.2 percent from a year earlier, but the figure came in roughly 4.7 percent below the market consensus. The result fell short of investors who had been hoping for an earnings surprise, capping the stock's rebound.

Market participants see the early recovery as bargain hunting following Tuesday's steep drop, which briefly pushed the Kospi below 6,000. Still, sentiment toward semiconductors remains divided: overnight on Wall Street, major chipmakers including Micron, AMD, Intel and Qualcomm all weakened, and the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index fell for a fourth consecutive session, compounding the disappointment from SK Hynix's earnings miss. The Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500, however, both closed higher.


kacew@heraldcorp.com