South Korean shares soar after chip stock rout
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- Kospi index rose roughly 17% in afternoon trading on Friday, partially reversing a three-day rout that had wiped hundreds of billions of dollars from South Korean market values.
- SK Hynix climbed more than 17% and Samsung Electronics jumped 23%, with chip rallies also pushing markets in Japan and Taiwan higher.
- Amazon and Microsoft surged in after-hours trading on Thursday after beating earnings expectations — Amazon by more than 9% and Microsoft by more than 15% — easing concerns over hundreds of billions in AI-infrastructure spending.
- South Korean regulators announced measures aimed at curbing the week's sell-off as AI-related stock jitters deepened.
- The Kospi had more than doubled in value during 2025 before hitting a mid-June record high, and despite the rout still sits 50% above its end-2025 level; the index triggered multiple circuit breakers this year amid intense retail-investor-driven volatility.
Why it matters: Retail-heavy South Korea has become a global bellwether for AI-investment sentiment — this week's circuit-breaker-triggering rout forced regulator intervention and was reversed only after US tech earnings reassured markets on AI spending. The Kospi's outsized weight in SK Hynix, a major Nvidia supplier, now drives global chip swings well beyond Seoul.
