Korean Stocks Fall Again in Afternoon Session; KOSPI Drops Below 8000 Level as SK Hynix Plunges 9% and Samsung Slumps 7%.

TradingKey - Korean stocks plunged in morning trading, triggering a circuit breaker. The KOSPI index remained under pressure in the afternoon, with Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix stock prices both hitting near half-month lows.

During the Asian trading session on July 2, the South Korean stock market plummeted in early trading. The KOSPI index fell over 6% at one point during the session, prompting the Korea Exchange to urgently trigger a program trading circuit breaker, suspending program trading sell orders for 5 minutes.

However, selling pressure on Korean stocks remained unabated in the afternoon. As of press time, the KOSPI index was down 5.87%, temporarily trading at 7816.39 points. The KOSPI index opened lower and trended downward today, but later rebounded, briefly rising above the 8,000-point mark during the session.

KOSPI Index Chart, Source: TradingView

In terms of individual stocks, the two memory giants performed largely in line with the broader market but suffered larger declines. Samsung Electronics plunged 7.15%, once again testing the 290,000 won threshold, temporarily trading at 292,000 won and touching its June 11 low; SK Hynix fell 8.83%, temporarily trading at 2,334,000 won and hitting its June 17 low.