Kospi Triggers Another Sidecar as Chip Rebound Stalls, Falls Over 6%

South Korea's Kospi sank 6.45% Wednesday, from 6,869 to 6,426 points. The Korea Exchange activated a sell-side sidecar for the benchmark in response.

Program trading on Kospi-listed shares was suspended for five minutes at 9:06 a.m. local time. The halt interrupted a rebound that had lifted the index in prior sessions.

Chip Stocks Lead the Sell-Off

A sell-side sidecar triggers automatically when Kospi 200 futures fall 5% or more for one minute. It pauses program sell orders for five minutes, without halting individual stock trading.

Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, which together drive much of the index's weighting, led Wednesday's decline. Investors tracked overnight losses on Wall Street, where chip stocks also sold off.

SK Hynix's U.S.-listed shares fell 9.20% to $155.62 in Tuesday's session. The stock slipped another 1.38% in after-hours trading, signaling further pressure into Wednesday.

The drop extends a volatile stretch for Korea's chip-heavy market. The index had staged a sharp rebound in recent weeks following earlier sidecar and circuit-breaker activations this year.

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