An electronic board showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index at a dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul on Tuesday. (Yonhap)

South Korean stocks opened slightly higher Tuesday backed by strong earnings performance by top cap Samsung Electronics and overnight US stock gains.

The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index gained 7.81 points, or 0.29 percent, to 2,665.25 in the first 15 minutes of trading.

Samsung Electronics, the world's largest memory chip manufacturer, announced earlier in the day its first quarter operating profit shot up more than tenfold from a year ago in the first quarter, with its chip business shifting to the black for the first time in five quarters.

Overnight, Wall Street shares advanced ahead of key corporate earnings announcements and the US Federal Reserve's rate decision meeting this week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.4 percent while the tech-heavy Nasdaq also added 0.4 percent. The S&P 500 gained 0.3 percent.

Market bellwether Samsung Electronics went up 0.52 percent, while consumer electronics rival LG Electronics added 0.43 percent.

Battery shares also fared better, with industry leader LG Energy Solution rising 1.59 percent and smaller rival Posco Future M gaining 0.87 percent.

On the contrary, auto and finance shares lost ground, with Hyundai Motor losing 0.99 percent and Kookmin Financial tumbling 1.96 percent.

The local currency was trading at 1,375.3 won against the US dollar, down 1.7 won from the previous session's close. (Yonhap)