South Korea: Stocks recover on foreign buying, won strengthens

[SEOUL] South Korea's Kospi stock index rose sharply early on Friday, while the won also gained on the local platform but bond yields fell.

At 01.31 GMT, the KOSPI was up 27.19 points, or 1.13 per cent, at 2,442.15. The index was buoyed by strong purchases from domestic institutions as well as foreign investors. Market heavyweight Samsung Electronics rose nearly 2 per cent.

The won was quoted at 1,077.6 per dollar on the onshore settlement platform , 0.62 per cent firmer than its previous close at 1,084.3.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 0.73 per cent, after US stocks ended the previous session with mild gains. Japanese stocks rose 0.2 per cent.

The Kospi is down around 2.2 per cent so far this year, and down by 3.82 per cent in the previous 30 days.

The current price-to-earnings ratio is 12.10, the dividend yield is 1.28 per cent and the market capitalisation is 1,242.04 trillion won.

The trading volume during the session on the Kospi index was 104,434,000 shares, and of the total traded issues of 877, the number of advancing sharesD was 461.

Foreigners were net buyers of 68,251 million won worth of shares.

The US dollar has risen 1.03 per cent against the won this year. The won's high for the year is 1,056.67 per dollar on Jan 14, 2018 and low is 1,098.4 on February 6 2018.

In money and debt markets, March futures on three-year treasury bonds rose 0.02 points to 107.62.

The Korean 3-month Certificate of Deposit benchmark rate was quoted at 1.65 per cent, while the benchmark 3-year Korean treasury bond yielded 2.294 per cent, lower than the previous day's 2.30 per cent.

REUTERS