Foreign investors have sold Samsung Electronics stock for 23 straight trading days, nearing the record for the longest selling streak at 25 days. The total value of shares sold during this period has already more than doubled the previous record.
According to the Korea Exchange, foreign investors sold a net 10.7 trillion won ($7.9 billion) worth of Samsung stock between Sept. 3 and Oct. 11. During that period, foreign ownership of Samsung shares fell from 56.02% at the end of August to 53.37% on Oct. 11, a drop of 2.65 percentage points.
Samsung’s stock price also dropped into the 50,000-won range, falling 20.3% from 74,400 won on Sept. 2 to 59,300 won on Oct. 11. On Oct. 10, the stock closed in the 50,000-won range for the first time in 19 months and remained there for a second consecutive day. During the 23-day selling spree, Samsung, the largest company by market capitalization on the Korean stock market, lost around 90 trillion won in value, falling to 354 trillion won.
If foreign investors continue selling for two more days, they will match the longest selling streak, set between March 25 and April 28, 2022, when foreign investors sold Samsung shares for 25 straight trading days following the start of the Russia-Ukraine war. That streak is the longest since relevant data began being tracked in 1999.
While the current streak hasn’t yet surpassed the previous one in duration, the value of shares sold has already exceeded it. During the 2022 streak, foreign investors sold a net 4.42 trillion won over 25 days. In the current streak, they have already sold more than twice that amount in just 23 days.
The recent decline in Samsung’s stock price is attributed to the downturn in the semiconductor industry and weaker-than-expected earnings. Samsung reported on Oct. 8 that its third-quarter operating profit was estimated at 9.1 trillion won. Analysts had downgraded their forecasts from 14 trillion won to around 10 trillion won, but the actual figure came in even lower.
Negative evaluations from international investment firms have also weighed on the stock. In September, Morgan Stanley lowered its target price for Samsung to 76,000 won, citing concerns about the high-bandwidth memory (HBM) business and suggesting that the DRAM market may have peaked. On Oct. 7, the firm issued another pessimistic report on the memory semiconductor sector, further dampening investor sentiment.
Meanwhile, SK Hynix has performed well, thanks to its competitive edge in the HBM sector. While foreign investors have been selling off Samsung shares, they have been net buyers of SK Hynix, purchasing 346.8 billion won worth of stock during the same period.
