Overview
- Seoul's KOSPI fell more than 3 percent in the latest trading session, leaving the index in the mid-6,600s as large technology names posted the biggest losses.
- Weekend statements from prominent AI figures urging a slowdown in development triggered selling in U.S. and Korean tech stocks and weighed on sentiment for the sector.
- An Omani announcement that a planned meeting to reopen transit through the Strait of Hormuz was suspended helped push Brent crude above $108 a barrel and raised energy-related market risk.
- Investor flows showed retail traders buying about 2.97 trillion won while institutional and foreign investors sold a combined net 4.46 trillion won, and the Korean won weakened to roughly 1,346–1,347 per dollar.
- With the U.S. 10-year Treasury yield near 5 percent and a Federal Reserve policy decision due this week, markets are watching for further rate-driven pressure on equities and continued rotation into defense and financial stocks.