Foreign Holdings of Korean Securities and Bonds Surpassed S670 Billion in Oct.

Foreign holdings of South Korean securities and bonds came to about 752 trillion won (US$672.63 billion) last month, reaching an all-time high.

The Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) announced that foreign ownership of local securities reached a fresh high of 752.3 trillion won (US$672.9 billion), including 651.2 trillion won (US$582.47 billion) of domestic stocks and 101.1 trillion won (US$90.43 billion) of bonds, as of the end of October.

This was because foreigners turned into net buyers from net sellers in both the securities and the bond markets for the first time in three months after July.

Foreign investors bought a net 2.42 trillion won (US$2.15 billion) of local stocks last month and their holdings of local stocks accounted for 33.9 percent of the total market capitalization in October.  

In the bond market, foreigners made a 698 billion won (US$624.33 million) investment, including the purchase of 7.3 trillion won (US$6.53 billion), sale of 5.4 trillion won (US$4.83 billion) and redemption at maturity of 1.2 trillion won (US$1.07 billion), last month. Foreign ownership of domestic bonds took up 6.1 percent of the total in October.