SEOUL, March 27 (Reuters) – Twenty-four-year-old Kim Min-sung’s gruelling schedule begins with intensive classes at Seoul’s Korea Foreign Language University followed by late nights at the library as he prepares for the notoriously competitive national diplomatic exam, a traditional path to a lucrative, secure foreign-service career.
Even so, Kim squeezes in as many side gigs as he can – math tutoring or running deliveries – to fund his other preoccupation: day trading. And he uses his final hours before bed every night mapping out investment strategies or modelling stock valuations.
He is far from alone.
South Korean retail investors – known locally as “ants” due to their collective behaviour – have piled into the domestic stock market in droves since January, and turbo-charged a world-beating doubling in the benchmark KOSPI over six months as it rallied to an all-time peak on February 27, the day before war broke out in the Middle East.
Subsequent volatility has been unprecedented, with the index plunging 12% on March 4 – the biggest daily loss ever. But instead of cashing out, the nation’s 14 million ants have doubled down, with average daily trading volume vaulting beyond 40 trillion won ($26.7 billion) for the first time this month.
On Monday of this week alone, retail investors bought a record 7 trillion won worth of stocks, even as the KOSPI slumped 6.5%.
The individual motivations behind the fervour vary, but there are common strands. Analysts point to growing worries that the rise of artificial intelligence could ultimately dismantle the traditional model of regular, stable employment income, spurring a race to head that off with profits from investment.
That’s certainly the case for Kim, who started trading as soon as he reached legal adulthood at 19.
“I have two trading accounts,” he explained, “one to make seed money to buy a property one day, and the other is for more aggressive investing to hopefully FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) sooner than later.”
Kim says he’s unfazed by this month’s volatility as the return on his “aggressive” account is still above 75%.
South Korea’s active stock trading accounts reached a record 101.8 million at the end of February, figures from the Korea Financial Investment Association (KOFIA) show.
And the ants command considerable firepower. Their combined deposit balance soared to an unprecedented 132 trillion won on March 4, up almost 70% from the end of last year, according to KOFIA data.
South Korea’s retail investors regularly account for up to 60% of daily turnover, according to Korea Securities Depository data, about double that of retail investors in the U.S.
The stocks frenzy has been further catalysed by President Lee Jae Myung, who has pledged sweeping financial reforms since taking office in June.
And his view that money should be redirected to stocks from housing – where it has long been concentrated rather than productively invested – has resonated with the nation’s youth, who have been priced out of the property market after decades of steep housing inflation.
Jessica Chung, a 42-year-old office worker in the Pangyo area of Seongnam just south of Seoul, said that her workplace has the atmosphere of a “gambling house” this month, with all the banter from the pantry to the powder room about stock trading.
Some analysts caution against overenthusiasm amid the geopolitical uncertainty.
“If the Iran war drags on, Korea’s real economy will inevitably be undergoing significant disruption,” said Seo Sang-Young, a market strategist at Mirae Asset Securities Co.
“That’s the biggest risk investors should consider.”
Kwon Soon-kuk, a 34-year-old full-timer at a retail company in Seoul, used this month’s selloff to buy more stocks at a discount.
“The biggest keyword here, I think, is uncertainty. The world is uncertain,” said Kwon, who checks images of marine traffic in the Strait of Hormuz on Telegram to gauge war-related risks for his portfolio.
“I don’t know when I’ll stop getting paychecks, so my plan is to buy more shares for my children.”
($1 = 1,499.40 won)
(Reporting by Jungmin Ryu, Sebin Choi, Cynthia Kim and Jihoon Lee; Editing by Kevin Buckland)
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