Reflecting the slowing economy and prolonged low interest rates, investors here have increasingly turned their eyes to real estate, gold and overseas securities, South Korea’s stock market operator said Wednesday.

Based on a survey of industry experts and media correspondents, the Korea Exchange selected its top 10 news stories about the domestic stock and derivative markets this year.



A representative phenomenon was the soaring demand for real estate investment trusts, or REITs, led by the initial public offerings of Lotte REIT in October and of NH Prime REIT in November. The combined subscription deposits of these two REITs amounted to 12.5 trillion won ($10.7 billion).

Also, the daily average amount of REIT transactions as of Dec. 20 stood at 6.4 billion won, up 384 percent from a year earlier. The corresponding figure for the final two months of the year reached 17.5 billion won, reflecting the escalating market response.

Other conspicuous developments included uptrends for gold, bond futures and dollar futures, KRX data showed.

The price of gold in the KRX Gold Market reached an all-time high of 61,300 won per gram on Aug. 13, up 33.3 percent from the end of last year.

As of Dec. 21, bond futures and dollar futures saw average daily transactions rise 21.8 percent and 21.6 percent, respectively, from the end of last year.

As an alternative to the sluggish stock market here, overseas investment marked a visible rise throughout the year, data also showed.

The settlement amount for US securities came to $27.7 billion as of November, up 30.3 percent from a year earlier, while the holding sum was $14 billion, up 42.8 percent from the end of last year, according to the Korea Securities Depository.

Meanwhile, a dampening factor was the plunge in the secondary Kosdaq market, mostly due to the bursting of the bubble in the once-promising biotech sector.

In response to a 7.46 percent drop in the Kosdaq on Aug. 5, a five-minute sidecar was activated for the first time in three years, raising alarm among investors.

Also, as the Morgan Stanley Capital Index was revised in November to reduce the ratio of Korean stocks, foreigners prolonged a selling spree for 21 consecutive days from Nov. 7 to Dec. 5, weighing down on liquidity here.

By Bae Hyun-jung (tellme@heraldcorp.com)