Foreign appetite for Korean stocks stayed lusty as it stretched beyond the traditional industries to new areas like bio, green, and robotics where Korea has been ascending fast.

Net purchases in Korean shares by non-Korean nationals reached 2.5 billion won ($2.3 billion) during the first 11 trading sessions of this year, according to the Korea Exchange on Wednesday.

Foreigners that led Korean stock market rally last year kept up their long position in the new year except for two trading days, and net purchased 1.8 trillion won worth stocks in the main Kospi bourse and 758.2 billion won worth stocks in the secondary Kosdaq.

Their favorite was Posco, the country’s largest steel maker, and purchased total 317.4 billion worth Posco shares so far this year. Tagging behind were Hyundai Motor Co. shares with overseas investors’ purchases totaling 185.7 billion won, chemical and green energy firm OCI Co. shares worth 171.4 billion won, and Shinhan Financial Group shares worth 158.3 billion won. They also bought 128.7 billion worth shares in Hyundai Robotics Co., the de facto holding entity of the country’s largest shipbuilder Hyundai Heavy Industries Co. and 100.6 billion won worth shares in the country’s leading battery maker LG Chem Ltd.

In the tech-heavy Kosdaq market, foreign investors focused their purchases mostly on bio and pharmaceutical related shares. They bought 658.7 billion worth Celltrion Inc. stocks, 36.8 billion worth Hugel Inc. stocks, and 29.3 billion won worth Viromed Co. stocks, all of them being in the biopharmaceutical sector.

By Shin Heon-cheol and Cho Jeehyun

[ⓒ Pulse by Maeil Business Newspaper & mk.co.kr, All rights reserved]