An electronic board showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index at a dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul on Friday. (Yonhap)
Seoul shares opened higher Friday, after another softer-than-expected US inflation reading.
The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index rose 15.67 points, or 0.6 percent, to 2,606.9 in the first 15 minutes of trading.
Overnight, the US producer price index, another key inflation reading, came in softer than expected in June. The report came a day after June's consumer price index showed US inflation slowed to a two-year low.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average inched up 0.14 percent, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite climbed 1.58 percent. The S&P 500 rose 0.85 percent.
In Seoul, big-cap shares opened mixed.
Market behemoth Samsung Electronics gained 0.97 percent and No. 2 chipmaker SK hynix jumped 2.1 percent. Top carmaker Hyundai Motor advanced 1.47 percent and its sister company Kia climbed 1.37 percent.
Leading battery maker LG Energy Solution lost 0.55 percent and Samsung Biologics shed 0.67 percent. Major chemical company LG Chem also went down 0.55 percent.
The local currency was trading at 1,269.9 won against the US dollar at 9:15 a.m., up 4.1 won from the previous session's close. (Yonhap)
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