Seoul: Stocks, won rise as uncertainties over U.S. mid-term election ease

[SEOUL] South Korea's Kospi stock index and the won rose on Thursday as uncertainties over the US mid-term election ironed out, while Sino-US trade concerns shrugged off as China's October exports beat analysts' expectations. South Korean yields rose as well.

China's October exports rose 15.6 per cent from a year earlier, while imports expanded 21.4 per cent, both handily beating analysts' expectations, official data showed on Thursday.

At 0632 GMT, the KOSPI ended up 13.94 points, or 0.67 per cent, at 2,092.63.

Kospi rebounded as the US mid-term election result appeared to be desirable, said Yoon Ji-sun, an analyst at BNK Securities. Some view that the Sino-US trade damage is taking a slower-than-expected pace as China's October exports rose, Mr Yoon added.

South Korea's second-largest biopharma firm Samsung BioLogics Co Ltd closed down 3.9 per cent on allegations of accounting violations.

The won was quoted at 1,117.3 per dollar on the onshore settlement platform, 0.54 per cent firmer than its previous close at 1,123.3.

In offshore trading, the won was quoted at 1,116.83 per US dollar, down 0.13 per cent from the previous day, while in one-year non-deliverable forwards it was being asked at 1,098.7 per dollar.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 0.59 per cent, after US stocks ended the previous session with gains. Japanese stocks rose 1.82 per cent.

The Kospi is down around 15.8 per cent so far this year, and down by 9.95 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 322,591,000 shares and, of the total traded issues of 896, the number of advancing shares was 718.

Foreigners were net buyers of 487,798 million won worth of shares.

The US dollar has risen 4.73 per cent against the won this year. The won's high for the year is 1,053.55 per dollar on April 2 2018 and low is 1,146.26 on October 11 2018.

In money and debt markets, December futures on three-year treasury bonds fell 0.01 per cent at 108.66.

The Korean three-month Certificate of Deposit benchmark rate was quoted at 1.7 per cent, while the benchmark 3-year Korean treasury bond yielded 1.96 per cent, lower than the previous day's 1.97 per cent.

REUTERS