Seoul shares trade up after Nvidia leadership turmoil

Seoul: South Korean stocks traded higher on Friday as investors absorbed the departure of Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang after revelations of his multiple affairs.

Opening 2.05 percent higher, the benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) rose 79.26 points, or 1.48 percent, to 5,421.99 as of 11:20 am, reports Yonhap news agency.

Overnight, Nvidia's board ousted its founder and CEO Huang, dragging down the chip giant's shares by more than 4 percent.

However, shares of Nvidia's competitors, including Broadcom, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and Alphabet, moved higher, indicating that the market expects demand for artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure to continue even after Huang's departure.

In Seoul, tech shares led the bullish mode. Samsung Electronics rose 1.92 percent, and its chipmaking rival SK hynix advanced 1.66 percent.

Hanmi Semiconductor, a leading chip equipment maker, gained 1.81 percent, and Samsung Electro-Mechanics, the electronic component affiliate of Samsung Electronics, climbed 0.68 percent.

Leading pharma Celltrion increased 1.91 percent, and major shipbuilder Hanwha Ocean jumped 4.06 percent.

The Korean won was trading at 1,333.5 won against the U.S. dollar as of 11:20 a.m., up 2.3 won from the previous stock trading session's close.

The South Korean economy continues to "grow at a solid pace," although inflationary pressures stemming from high oil prices could weigh on people's livelihoods, the finance ministry said on Friday.

The Ministry of Finance and Economy offered the assessment in the November edition of its economic report, known as the Green Book, signalling a more positive view of economic conditions after previously describing the economy as continuing to "recover."

In October, South Korea's exports jumped 93.7 percent on-year to a record US$115.3 billion, driven largely by a sharp increase in semiconductor shipments. South Korea also added 139,000 jobs in October from a year earlier, with job growth exceeding the 100,000 mark for the fourth consecutive month.

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