Tech Shares May Boost South Korea Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The South Korea stock market on Tuesday snapped the two-day slide in which it had dropped more than 65 points or 1.6 percent. The KOSPI now sits just beneath the 4,000-point plateau and it may extend its gains on Wednesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is upbeat, with technology shares expected to lead the markets higher. The European markets were mixed and little changed and the U.S. bourses were modestly higher and the Asian markets figure to split the difference.

The KOSPI finished sharply higher on Tuesday following gains from the financial shares, technology stocks and automobile producers.

For the day, the index soared 74.56 points or 1.90 percent to finish at the daily high of 3,994.93 after moving as low as 3,935.14. Volume was 315.13 million shares worth 12.23 trillion won. There were 641 gainers and 223 decliners.

Among the actives, Shinhan Financial jumped 2.13 percent, while KB Financial soared 4.51 percent, Hana Financial collected 3.07 percent, Samsung Electronics rallied 2.58 percent, Samsung SDI expanded 2.01 percent, LG Electronics strengthened 2.11 percent, SK Hynix spiked 3.72 percent, LG Chem dipped 0.13 percent, Lotte Chemical advanced 2.34 percent, SK Innovation improved 0.79 percent, SK Telecom eased 0.19 percent, KEPCO climbed 1.60 percent, Hyundai Mobis surged 4.45 percent, Hyundai Motor accelerated 4.52 percent, Kia Motors vaulted 4.19 percent and Naver and POSCO Holdings were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is cautiously optimistic as the major averages opened higher on Tuesday and remained in the green throughout the session, although it was a choppy day.

The Dow climbed 185.13 points or 0.39 percent to finish at 47,474.46, while the NASDAQ jumped 137.75 points or 0.59 percent to close at 23,413.67 and the S&P 500 added 16.74 points or 0.25 percent to end at 6,829.37.

The strength on Wall Street came amid a strong rebound by Bitcoin, as the cryptocurrency soared by more than 6 percent after moving sharply lower on Monday. Bitcoin's rally along with an advance by AI darling Nvidia (NVDA) may have been an indication of renewed risk appetite.

Semiconductor stocks helped lead the markets higher, with the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index jumping by 1.8 percent. Considerable strength was also visible among computer stocks, as reflected by the 1.7 percent gain posted by the NYSE Arca Computer Hardware Index.

Crude oil prices gave ground on Tuesday as efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine conflict have sent positive signals of a ceasefire sooner than expected. West Texas Intermediate crude for January delivery was down $0.55 or 0.93 percent at $58.77 per barrel.

Closer to home, South Korea will provide Q3 data for gross domestic product later this morning, with forecasts suggesting an increase of 1.2 percent on quarter and 1.7 percent on year after adding 0.7 percent on quarter and 0.6 percent on year in the three months prior.