Foreign Investors Sell 19 Trillion Won of Korean Stocks in February... Largest Net Outflow Ever

Three Record-Breaking Net Sell-Offs in Top Five Occurred Within a Month

Last month, foreign investors recorded the largest-ever net selling of domestic stocks.

According to the International Finance Center on March 3, foreigners had a net selling of domestic stocks worth 19.9 trillion won in February. This is the largest monthly net outflow on record.

On a daily basis as well, there were three instances of net selling that ranked among the top five largest in history. The net selling of 7.1 trillion won on February 27 was the highest ever, while February 5 (minus 5.3 trillion won) ranked second, and February 6 (minus 3.3 trillion won) ranked fourth.

On the 3rd, the KOSPI and exchange rates were displayed on the status board in the dealing room of Hana Bank's headquarters in Jung-gu, Seoul. Photo by Yonhap News.

By sector, there was a net outflow of approximately 21 trillion won from the electrical and electronics sector alone. A total of 22.2 trillion won flowed out from just two stocks: Samsung Electronics (minus 14.6 trillion won) and SK hynix (minus 7.6 trillion won).

The financial sector shifted from a net inflow in January to a net outflow of 2.3 trillion won in February. The transportation and equipment sector continued to see outflows, but the scale in February (minus 200 billion won) was smaller than in January (minus 4.1 trillion won).

The International Finance Center analyzed, "Since the beginning of this year, as Samsung Electronics rose by 80.6% and SK hynix by 63.0%, the incentive for profit-taking has increased, and there may have been rebalancing moves to maintain portfolio target allocations."

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