Sidecar and Circuit Breaker Triggered Again... KOSPI Drops to the 5,000s in Historic Plunge

Individuals Unload Nearly 3 Trillion Won
KOSPI Plunges Over 12% Intraday

On July 29, the KOSPI index experienced a historic intraday plunge, falling into the 5,000-point range. Stocks leading the market, particularly in the semiconductor sector, plummeted, which triggered the sell-sidecar (temporary suspension of program sell orders) for two consecutive days and even led to a circuit breaker that temporarily halted trading.

On this day, the KOSPI closed at 5,663.24, down 5.98% from the previous day. This followed a steep decline of 10.8% the day before, marking a second consecutive day of a downward market. The session started on a positive note—opening at 6,089.11, up 1.09% from the previous session, and even expanding its gains to increase by as much as 3.40% at one point.

However, from around 10:30 a.m., the market sharply reversed course. By 1:33 p.m., the index had dropped to 5,262.77, a 12.63% decrease from the previous day. This was the first time in about four months since April 2 that the KOSPI had fallen into the 5,200-point range during trading hours.

In both major markets, back-to-back triggers of the sell-sidecar and circuit breakers were observed. On this day, the Korea Exchange activated a circuit breaker at around 12:32 p.m., suspending trading on the KOSPI market for 20 minutes. A circuit breaker is triggered when the index drops by 8% or more from the previous day’s closing price and remains at that level for at least one minute.

By investor type, foreign investors and individuals were net sellers of 829.9 billion won and 2.9895 trillion won, respectively. Institutions were net buyers, purchasing a net total of 3.7078 trillion won.

Nearly every sector sharply declined. Several industries even outpaced the overall index decline, including construction (-0.05%), medical & precision equipment (-7.73%), electrical & electronics (-7.37%), manufacturing (-6.51%), machinery & equipment (-6.08%), and securities (-6.00%). Food, beverage & tobacco was the only sector to rise, gaining 1.31%.

The top 10 market cap stocks all tumbled. Declines were particularly steep in the following order: SK hynix (-8.3%), SK Square (-7.6%), Samsung Life Insurance (-6.8%), Samsung Biologics (-5.4%), LG Energy Solution (-4.6%), Samsung Electro-Mechanics (-3.4%), KB Financial Group (-2.8%), Hyundai Motor Company (-2.7%), and Samsung Electronics (-2.5%).

The KOSDAQ index also fell, closing regular trading at 662.68, down 6.12% from the day before. Like the KOSPI, it had started over 1% higher, but soon began to lose ground. During the session, it slumped as much as 10.61% compared to the previous day, dropping to 630.99 at its lowest point.

Foreign investors and institutions were net buyers of 336.3 billion won and 146.7 billion won, respectively, while individuals remained net sellers of 480.3 billion won.

All sectors declined across the board. Sectors that fell by over 6% included electrical & electronics (-8.18%), non-metallics (-7.51%), metals (-7.15%), general services (-7.01%), medical & precision equipment (-6.76%), construction (-6.62%), finance (-6.27%), and manufacturing (-6.20%).

Among the top 10 market cap stocks, Jusung Engineering saw the sharpest drop at 9.8%. It was followed by EcoPro BM (-9.7%), ABL Bio (-8.7%), EcoPro (-8.1%), Wonik IPS (-7.0%), Leeno Industrial (-5.8%), and Alteogen (-5.2%). The only gainers in the top 10 were Pharmaresearch (up 2.8%), Rainbow Robotics (up 2.6%), and HLB (up 1.8%).

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.