Korean stocks buoyed by Wall Street gains, Fed comments

Shares ended higher Thursday, tracking gains on Wall Street, buoyed by Federal Reserve officials' dovish comments on interest rates and tech gains. The won depreciated against the dollar. The Kospi rose 29.74 points, or 1.21 percent, to close at...

Screens in Hana Bank's trading room in central Seoul show the Kospi closing at 2,479.82 points on Thursday, up 1.21 percent, or 29.74 points, from the previous trading session. [YONHAP]

Shares ended higher Thursday, tracking gains on Wall Street, buoyed by Federal Reserve officials' dovish comments on interest rates and tech gains. The won depreciated against the dollar.

The Kospi rose 29.74 points, or 1.21 percent, to close at 2,479.82.

The secondary Kosdaq rose 18.37 points, or 2.25 percent, to close at 835.49.

Trading volume was moderate at 505.19 million shares worth 8.79 trillion won ($6.5 billion), with gainers outpacing losers 676 to 201.

Institutions bought a net 254.08 billion won worth of stocks, offsetting foreigners' and individuals' combined selling valued at 245 billion won.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.2 percent to 33,804.87 overnight, and the Nasdaq composite gained 0.7 percent to 13,659.68.

Analysts said investors were relieved due to less hawkish comments from Fed officials despite higher-than-expected producer prices in the United States in September.

Fed officials have said the U.S. central bank does not need to keep tightening as rates are near their peak, and it needs to take a wait-and-see approach before raising rates further.

In Seoul, tech and airline stocks led gains.

Samsung Electronics rose 1 percent to 68,900 won, SK hynix jumped 4.2 percent to 124,200 won, Korean Air gained 0.7 percent to 20,600 won, and Jeju Air was up 1.7 percent to 10,620 won.

Energy shares ended in positive terrain.

LG Energy Solution rose 0.30 percent to 493,500 won, and Samsung SDI added 4.70 percent to 535,000 won.

Samsung Biologics rose 0.41 percent to 728,000 won, and LG Chem jumped 2.12 percent to 529,000 won.

Celltrion was up 2.27 percent to 144,100 won.

Posco shares were strong, with Posco Holdings rising 2.17 percent to 518,000 won and Posco Future M rose 2.05 percent to 348,000 won.

Among decliners, Hyundai Motor fell 0.7 percent to 188,000 won, while Hyundai Mobis went down 0.43 percent to 234,000 won.

S-Oil declined 1.6 percent to 73,500 won, and Korea Electric Power shed 0.8 percent to 17,510 won.

The local currency ended at 1,338.50 won against the greenback, up 0.2 won from the previous session's close.

Bond prices, which move inversely to yields, closed higher. The yield on three-year government bonds fell 3.2 basis points to 3.93 percent, and the return on the benchmark U.S. 10-year government bonds fell 10.0 basis points to 4.562 percent.

BY KIM JI-YE, YONHAP [kim.jiye@joongang.co.kr]