Japan, South Korea Stocks Rise in Early Trade; KOSPI Gains Over 1%, Nikkei 225 Up 0.4%, SK Hynix Rises Nearly 2%

TradingKey - On August 4, major stock indices in Japan and South Korea both opened higher. South Korea's Kospi Composite Index (KOSPI) opened 1.5% higher before narrowing its gains to about 1.24% at 6,334.94 points; Japan's Nikkei 225 index maintained its gains after opening higher, rising 0.40% to 64,009.44 points.

Source: TradingView

In individual stocks, South Korea's semiconductor sector performed steadily. SK Hynix rose 1.98% to 1,598,000 won (about $1,117); Samsung Electronics gained 1.04% to 242,000 won.

Japanese tech stocks were also generally higher, with Kioxia rising 3.58% to 50,920 yen (about $324); SoftBank Group gained 1.71% to 5,485 yen.

On the news front, SK Hynix announced that it, in partnership with SanDisk ( SNDK ), has jointly released the first standard specification for next-generation memory technology—High Bandwidth Flash (HBF). As the demand for memory bandwidth from AI servers and high-performance computing continues to rise, HBF is seen as an important development direction for future AI memory architectures, and the collaboration between the two companies has further boosted market confidence in the advanced memory supply chain.

Overnight, U.S. stocks continued their rebound from the latter half of last week, with tech stocks continuing to lead the rally. The S&P 500 Index rose 1.48% to close at 7,600.50 points; the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 693 points to hit a record closing high; the Nasdaq Composite Index gained 2.13%. The strength in the U.S. tech sector provided positive cues for Asian markets.

On the geopolitical front, U.S. President Trump said last Sunday that the U.S. and Iran are expected to hold talks on Monday, adding that "after the Hormuz agreement comes the nuclear agreement." However, Iran subsequently denied claims that the two sides would hold talks, and the market will continue to monitor developments in the Middle East and their impact on global risk assets.