Shares of Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, which together make up more than half of market capitalization for South Korea's Kospi, rebounded Friday, helping to lift the benchmark above 8000 again.
The Kospi rose 5.8% to close at 8088.34, snapping a two-session losing streak. Institutional investors remained net buyers, helping drive the recovery after the index slipped below 8000 on Thursday.
The rebound was largely driven by the world's two largest memory-chip makers. Samsung and SK Hynix jumped 8.2% and 11%, respectively, recovering most of their losses in the prior session.
Both stocks are major beneficiaries of the global artificial-intelligence boom, which is driving red-hot demand for advanced chips to power AI applications.
At the heart of the Kospi's recent wild swings is skittish investor sentiment over concerns that technology companies may be overbuilding data-center capacity. Meta Platforms' reported plan to sell excess AI computing capacity fueled these concerns, triggering a selloff in Asian chip stocks on Thursday.
Some analysts, however, said the business fundamentals and outlook for chip makers such as Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix remain solid.
Samsung's recent share-price pullback may be a technical correction, Citigroup analyst Peter Lee said. The stock has surged more than 150% this year. He estimates Samsung's second-quarter operating profit to reach 84 trillion won, equivalent to $54.54 billion, up nearly 18-fold from a year earlier, supported by better-than-expected server DRAM chip pricing driven by strong demand for AI central processing units.
"We believe memory fundamentals are intact and server DRAM pricing has been outperforming on strong CPU demand," Lee said, raising his 2026 operating profit forecast for Samsung to 401 trillion won from 334 trillion won.
SK Hynix is also set to benefit from accelerating AI infrastructure investment and a memory-chip supply shortage projected to persist through 2028, according to KB Securities analysts.
KB projected global AI investments to total $800 billion in 2026, $1.1 trillion in 2027 and $1.5 trillion in 2028. The brokerage raised its 2026 operating-profit forecast for SK Hynix by 3.6% to 290 trillion won.
"The upward trend in SK Hynix's earnings and stock price is far from over, driven by the continued expansion of AI-related investments," the KB analysts, led by Jeff Kim, said in a note.
Write to Kwanwoo Jun at kwanwoo.jun@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
July 03, 2026 04:09 ET (08:09 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2026 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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