South Korea’s Kospi index jumps more than 13% on a surge of chipmaking stocks

South Korea’s Kospi index has jumped more than 13%, tracking Wall Street gains, as artificial intelligence-related stocks bounced back after losses this week

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The top photos of the day by AP photojournalists (Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.)

South Korea’s Kospi index jumped more than 13% on Friday, tracking Wall Street gains, as artificial intelligence-related stocks bounced back after losses this week.

In early Asian trading, the Kospi rose 13.1% to 6,330.59. Shares of South Korean technology giant Samsung Electronics surged 19.3%, while memory chipmaker SK Hynix soared 22.6%.

The Kospi index had plummeted more than 16% on Tuesday and Wednesday on a sell-off of technology stocks in part over worries about an AI bubble and rising intensive competition from chipmaking rivals in China.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 also climbed 4.9% in early Friday trading. Multinational investment holding company and OpenAI-investor SoftBank Group jumped 15.1%, while chip equipment maker Tokyo Electron rose 9.2%.

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