Selling Mode
Foreign investors net sold more than 2 trillion won (US$1.87 billion) worth of South Korean stocks last month, shifting to a “selling mode” in just one month. However, they net invested about 708 billion won (US$661.99 million) in bonds.
According to data from the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) on May 14, offshore investors offloaded a net 2.2 trillion won (US$2.06 billion) worth of local stocks in April.
By country, investors from Britain and Saudi Arabia were major net sellers last month, selling 1.4 trillion won (US$1.31 billion) and 1.2 trillion won (US$1.12 billion) worth of stocks, respectively, while those from Luxemburg sold 400 billion won (US$374.01 million).
In contrast, investors from the United States net bought 1.4 trillion won (US$1.31 billion), while Chinese and Singaporean investors purchased 200 billion won (US$187 million) each.
Accordingly, foreign investors held a total of 643.8 trillion won (US$601.96 billion) worth of local stocks at the end of April, up 18.6 trillion won (US$17.39 billion) from a month earlier. The figure accounted for 32 percent of the country's market capitalization.
Of the total, the U.S. took up 41.9 percent with 269.8 trillion won (US$252.27 billion) of shares, followed by Britain with 8 percent, or 51.7 trillion won (US$48.34billion), Luxemburg with 6.5 percent, or 41.6 trillion won (US$38.9 billion), Singapore with 5.2 percent, or 33.4 trillion won (US$31.23 billion) and Japan with 2.4 percent, or 15.6 trillion won (US$14.59 billion).
While foreigners sold local shares, they were net buyers of local bonds, extending the buying mode for a fourth straight month. They net bought another 4.3 trillion won (US$4.02 billion) of bonds in April. Considering 3.59 trillion won (US$3.36 billion) of redemption at maturity, offshore investors net invested 708 billion won (US$661.99 million). Asia and the Americas made a net investment of 1.8 trillion won (US$1.68 billion) and 200 billion won (US$187 million), respectively.
By types of bonds, foreign investors net invested 1.68 trillion won (US$1.57 billion) in government bonds. By term to maturity, they made the largest investment of 1.38 trillion won (US$1.29 billion) in bonds with one to five years of maturity.
Their holdings of local debt stood at 105.2 trillion won (US$983.64 billion) at the end of last month, accounting for 6.2 percent of the total market.