[Anchor]

Influenced by the historic plunge on the U.S. Nasdaq overnight, the KOSPI briefly fell below the 5,000 mark during trading. A circuit breaker was triggered just three minutes after the market opened, and the index is currently pausing and catching its breath around the 5,000 level.

Reporter Min Gyeongho has the details.

[Reporter]

Starting 2.24% lower, the KOSPI plummeted immediately after the market opened, dropping more than 8% within three minutes to fall below the 5,000 threshold.

As a flood of sell orders poured in, a circuit breaker was triggered at 9:03 a.m., halting trading for 20 minutes.

This marks the first time the KOSPI has recorded figures in the 4,000s during trading since February.

In just about three minutes, foreign investors net-sold 130 billion won, while institutional and retail investors net-bought 86 billion won and 42 billion won, respectively.

Even after the circuit breaker was lifted, the KOSPI experienced severe fluctuations and is currently recording the 5,160 level as of 11:30 a.m.

Samsung Electronics is trading in the 190,000 won range down by the 3% level, while SK Hynix is hovering around 1.2 million won down by about 5%.

The KOSPI appears to have been impacted by the Nasdaq recording its largest-ever drop overnight.

The Nasdaq plummeted 5.52% amid growing concerns that stricter regulations on data centers could be enforced after the Democratic Party secured control of both the Senate and the House of Representatives in the U.S. midterm elections.

Immediately following the conclusion of the midterm elections, shares of hyperscalers such as Microsoft, Amazon, and Alphabet rose while infrastructure companies including semiconductors plunged, but this time all sectors appeared to take a hit.

In particular, the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index crashed by 12.2%, and the KOSPI, where Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix account for nearly half of the total market capitalization, could not avoid that impact.

Affected by the plunge in the KOSPI, a sidecar for selling was also triggered on the Kosdaq.

The Kosdaq is currently at 654, with retail and foreign investors net-selling approximately 150 billion won.

[Video Editing: Lee Sang-min]