South Korea calls emergency financial meeting as KOSPI suffers historic collapse

South Korea’s top financial officials are gathering for an emergency session on Wednesday evening, a move that underscores just how badly things have deteriorated in one of Asia’s most important equity markets. The KOSPI index has shed approximately 40% from its June 2026 peak, making July its worst month on record. Finance Minister Koo Yun-cheol is presiding over the meeting, which brings together the Financial Services Commission, the Financial Supervisory Service, and the Bank of Korea. A market in freefall Multiple circuit breakers have been triggered during July’s trading sessions, the kind of automated halts designed to prevent panic selling from spiraling into something worse. The semiconductor sector sits at the center of the wreckage. Companies like SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics, which together represent a massive chunk of KOSPI’s total weighting, have dragged the broader index down as investor confidence in the chip cycle has evaporated. Retail investors, who play an outsized role in Korean markets compared to most developed economies, have been net sellers throughout the decline. Regulators already tried once this month This isn’t the first emergency huddle South Kore...