Selling Spree
Foreigners continued net selling for three months by selling a net 3.1 trillion won in stocks in the Korean stock market in January.
According to the Financial Supervisory Service on January 11, the UK topped the list of net selling nations by selling a net 1.2 trillion won in Korean stocks. The UK was followed by China and the Cayman Islands, which sold 500 and 300 billion won in stocks.
On the other hand, Singapore and Canada purchased net 200 and 100 billion won, respectively, in Korean stocks while Luxembourg a net 52.4 billion won. These three nations were net selling countries only in December 2015. But in the New Year, they switched to net buying.
By region, Asia and Europe continued net selling of 454.6 billion won and 2,239.6 billion won, respectively and Middle Eastern funds of 52.1 billion won left the Korean stock market. But the exodus of Middle Eastern money slowed down in January compared to December of last year when an outflow of Middle Eastern money reached over 800 billion won
At the end of January, Korean stocks that foreigners were holding stood at 404 trillion won, 17 trillion down from December of last year. The proportion of stocks foreigners were holding stood at 28.1 percent, a drop of 0.5 percentage points from December of 2015. By nations, the US, the UK and Luxembourg held 169,700 billion won, 32,300 billion won and 23,900 billion won as the top three largest stockholding foreign nations.
In the meantime, during the same period, foreigners recorded net outflows of 500 billion won in going public bonds. The top three nations were Malaysia (-400 billion won), Singapore (-200 billion won), Luxembourg (-100 million won). By contrast, Switzerland topped the net investment nation list, followed by Israel and Arab Emirates.