SEOUL (AFP) – South Korean stocks tumbled over five per cent yesterday as Asian markets sank and United States (US) futures signalled steep Wall Street losses, driven by US President Donald Trump’s harsh tariffs despite countries seeking compromise with the defiant president.
Trump’s tariff offensive has sparked a global stock market rout, raising fears of a broader trade war and recession.
South Korea’s benchmark KOSPI index dived 5.26 per cent, or 129.57 points, to 2,335.85, triggering a so-called sidecar mechanism that briefly halted some trading for the first time in eight months.
Sidecars kick in when index futures experience significant drops or spikes, pausing programme trading for five minutes to mitigate drastic fluctuations.
Samsung Electronics dropped 4.28 per cent, while SK hynix plummeted nearly 6.5 per cent. “South Korea has a very high trade dependency; it’s a country that lives off trade, so when the US imposes excessively high tariffs like this, we become one of the hardest-hit economies,” Kim Dae-jong at Sejong University in Seoul told AFP.
Trump’s ‘America First’ policy is “a major threat to South Korea’s economy and national security,” added Kim.
