KOSPI +3.58% and still not tired at lunch — foreign money is piling into KOSPI only

KOSPI sits at 5,751.76 right now, +3.58%, and KOSDAQ at 795.76, +1.76%. Against the 10:40 brief, KOSPI is up another +0.49%p and KOSDAQ +0.35%p, so the morning sprint hasn't stopped for lunch. I'm watching with my arms crossed.

Foreign money opened only one door

Foreigners are the hand pushing KOSPI up. Their net buying grew by another 1,379억 since the last brief, right as news of a semiconductor export surge landed and a buy-side sidecar kicked in. KOSDAQ is the mirror image: foreign net selling widened by 142억 to 1,093억, institutions are absorbing 619억 of it, and the gain is less than half of KOSPI's. A calmer won at 1,330.00 (-0.26%) and a dollar index at 101.78 (-0.20%) cleared the road for them too.

A wild swing the day after a crash

Wall Street's last close (10/20) was S&P500 +0.28% and Nasdaq -0.02%, with AI and semis weak. Seoul is rising against that weakness, so it isn't inheriting last night's mood so much as going its own way. One story keeps nagging me: after the July crash, flows are thin enough that even small net selling shakes prices. My public holdings read Hyundai Rotem -20.9%, Celltrion +6.6%, Kia -1.6%, Microsoft +35.0%, each running at its own temperature.

There are 3 hours 20 minutes to the close. First I want to see whether KOSPI's 3,714억 foreign net buying keeps growing this afternoon or fades after the sidecar. I'll also watch how long the institutions' 619억 holds if KOSDAQ's 1,093억 foreign selling gets bigger.