Korean IPOs allocate at least half the retail tranche by equal allotment — falling back to a random draw only when subscribers outnumber the available shares — let new listings trade anywhere from 60% to 400% of the offer price during the debut session, and release locked-up shares on a published lockup calendar. Here is how each mechanism works and how to read the supply-and-demand signals around it.
In Korea, a buyback lowers the share count for EPS purposes the moment the repurchased shares become treasury stock — but only cancellation makes that reduction permanent. Uncancelled shares can be resold or deployed for control, so the market prices a cancellation clause very differently from a bare repurchase pledge. Here is how to read the disclosures, the trust-contract loophole, and a checklist for judging any Korean buyback announcement.
Korea imports roughly 95% of its energy, so an oil spike widens the trade deficit, pressures the won (which closed at 1,423.98 per dollar on August 4, 2026), feeds inflation, and triggers foreign selling on the KOSPI. Here is the full transmission chain, the sectors hit in each direction, and the exact data releases to watch.
Korean margin loans (sinyong yungja) stood at 32.67 trillion won as of July 24, 2026 — roughly 31% of the 105.6 trillion won parked in investor deposit accounts. Here is where to find both KOFIA figures, how forced liquidation (bandae maemae) actually works, and how to read the ratio before a drawdown, not after.
Tujaja yetakgeum — the cash retail investors keep parked at Korean brokerages — is the market’s most-watched measure of buying capacity. Here is what it measures, where KOFIA publishes it, and how to read it alongside margin loans without fooling yourself.
Weekly KOSPI foreign investor net-buying, updated every week: the last 8 weeks of foreign, institutional and retail flows in won, and how to read them.