KOSPI falls toward 6,500 as chip sentiment remains weak

The KOSPI extended its losing streak, Monday, falling toward 6,500 as sentiment surrounding the semiconductor sector weakened further amid growing risks related to a military conflict between the U.S. and Iran.

The benchmark closed at 6,516.27, down 4.46 percent from the previous session.

It opened 2.6 percent lower and extended its decline.

A sell-side sidecar was triggered at 11:21 a.m., marking the 20th such activation on Korea's main bourse this year.

Institutional investors sold a net 919 billion won ($621 million) of shares.

Foreign and retail investors bought a net 515.3 billion won and 349.1 billion won, respectively.

The Korean stock market reflected external headwinds that had accumulated during Friday's holiday closure and over the weekend, according to Lee Kyoung-min, an analyst at Daishin Securities.

An artificial intelligence (AI) model from China's Moonshot, called Kimi K3, was assessed as delivering performance close to that of the most advanced models from OpenAI and Anthropic.

The news raised questions about whether the massive capital expenditures undertaken by hypersc ...