President Lee Jae-myung said Saturday that he does not understand why the benchmark KOSPI should be calculated excluding semiconductors, calling chips "one of the core pillars of Korean industry."
Lee made the remarks on X, formerly Twitter, while sharing an article based on a brokerage analysis that estimated the effective KOSPI level at around 4,100 to 4,200 when semiconductor stocks are excluded. The analysis pointed to a growing polarization in the Korean stock market driven by the heavy concentration in semiconductor shares.
"No one says, 'Is Son Heung-min just an ordinary person without his soccer skills?'" Lee wrote. "Shouldn't we instead say, 'Even without semiconductors, the Korean stock market is still at a remarkable 4,100'?"
Lee pushed back against what he characterized as an "optical illusion" argument surrounding the KOSPI's recent surge, stressing that semiconductors leading the market is a natural phenomenon and that even the index excluding chips remains at a higher level than a year ago.
