Everyone Sold Today — I Didn't Touch a Single Thing

Today the KOSPI dropped 3.23% and the KOSDAQ slid 2.14%, with sellers showing up from the opening bell and never really letting up. Seeing both indices get hit this hard on the same day isn't something I run into very often, and it wasn't a comfortable screen to watch.

The biggest driver was foreigners and institutions dumping shares together. On the KOSPI, foreign investors sold about 2.2984 trillion won worth and institutions another 1.2184 trillion won, while on the KOSDAQ foreigners sold roughly 312.3 billion won and institutions 215.9 billion won — with flow breaking down that badly, there was no way the index could hold up. In the middle of that, Trump brushing off warnings to slow AI development and insisting the US 'has to beat China' gave semiconductor and AI names a bit of a tailwind, so that corner of the market held up relatively well, while fintech and biotech both slipped further and dragged the broader index down harder. On top of that, the government rolling out 103 trillion won for small merchants and SMEs ahead of Chuseok and extending loan maturities to 28 days added some warmth, and with bitcoin pausing around $77,000 ahead of the FOMC, the whole market felt like it was holding its breath for the next big event.

The real economy still looks like it's losing a bit of steam, even as the overall market mood stays fairly calm. So I'm reading today's drop less as a trend reversal and more as noise that comes out while everyone waits for what's next. That's exactly why I didn't add a single position today — on days like this, just watching feels like the right call.