Retail investors sold 16.8 trillion won into Korea's chip rally in five sessions

On the 7th the index rose 4.61% to 6,995.39 while individuals net sold 6.8274 trillion won, the second-largest daily retail figure on record ^[2][5]. Someone took the other side of all of it. That single session was 40.6% of the 16.8356 trillion won individuals sold across five consecutive sessions through the 9th, an average of 3.367 trillion won a day ^[1][2]. Seoul Economic Daily attributes the selling to investors who bought during the June-July slump and are unloading near 7,000 to recover their principal ^[6].

IBK Investment & Securities puts a size on absorption. While daily net selling by foreign investors stays below 2 trillion won, buying by other corporate entities can take up most of it, and above that line declines deepen ^[15]. Retail's one-day total on the 7th was 3.4 times that threshold ^[3]. Different investor category, different counterparties, so the two figures do not net against each other, but together they mark the range of selling this market has absorbed this month.

It has been an orderly week by June's standard. No sidecar has been triggered on either the KOSPI or the KOSDAQ this month, and the VKOSPI closed the 11th at 46.28, 47.7% of the 96.94 it printed on June 29 ^[7][8][4].

The macro went the other way. Brent is up about 30% in the second half of the year to above $100 a barrel as the war in Iran escalated again. The US 10-year traded as high as 4.97% on the 11th. That is three basis points short of the 5% mark that Seoul Economic Daily says could weigh heavily on equity sentiment ^[9][10][7]. The plain reading of those two numbers is that the memory trade is now a rates trade. SK Securities argues from this year's own record that money moves the other way: when oil and Treasury yields rose together from March through May, Korean IT hardware and semiconductors strengthened ^[13]. Kang Dae-seung, an analyst at SK Securities, said: "The less attractive other sectors such as consumer discretionary and energy become as investments under high oil prices and high interest rates, the more funds can concentrate again on semiconductors, where profit forecasts remain solid" ^[14].

IBK calls the KOSPI below 6,800 undervalued in valuation terms, and the mid-6,000s the main support line once buybacks by Samsung Electronics and SK hynix are counted ^[16][17]. From the 6,909.91 close, 6,800 is 1.6% away ^[5]. The index is already 141.73 points, or 2.0%, below where it finished on the 9th ^[6].

Futures price about 60% odds of an increase at the meeting on the 15th and 16th and about 85% odds of at least one this year ^[11]. The pricing does not rule out an unexpected increase, given inflation pressure from oil and solid US employment data, and even a hold carrying a hawkish signal on a fourth-quarter move would weigh on equities ^[12]. Seoul Economic Daily reports the meeting is expected to decide whether the index holds above 7,000 ^[18].

In my view the next 150 points here depend more on the size of foreign net selling than on what Astra does to memory demand ^[3]. A chipmaker's buyback is a bid of known size. A rotation into semiconductors is a preference that can be revised in an afternoon. Kang's counter-argument has evidence I do not have: two months this spring in which rising oil and rising yields pushed Korean money into chips ^[13]. If foreign net selling clears 2 trillion won in a session and the index holds 6,900 anyway, the flow frame is wrong and the sector frame is right.