Oil Shock Aftershocks, But the Afternoon Slide Eased a Notch

The KOSPI's down 2.38% at 6,866.18 and the KOSDAQ's off 1.65% at 823.15 as we roll through the afternoon, but both have clawed back a bit from where they stood at the 10:40 check-in, so I'm breathing a little easier. Overnight (as of the 9/10 close), U.S. semiconductors and clean energy names were actually the strong spot, but a Trump-driven oil shock sent Brent surging past 6% and pushed the 10-year Treasury yield right up to the 5% doorstep, dragging the S&P 500 and Nasdaq down together — and today that same jitters is doing the opposite here, knocking our local chip names lower. Foreigners dumped more than 2.6 trillion won of KOSPI names but institutions caught some of it, while on the KOSDAQ institutions bought back nearly 1.4 trillion won against foreign selling, which is why its drop is shallower than the KOSPI's. In my own book, Poongsan's holding up at +7.7% and Samsung Electronics at +2.4%, while Deoksan Neolux is still sore at -12.4% and KT&G sits at -1.9%. Into the close, I'm watching whether oil and U.S. yields keep spiking, and whether institutional buying can keep absorbing the foreign selling.