South Korean stocks opened lower Thursday, tracking overnight losses on Wall Street.

The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) shed 12.68 points, or 0.68 percent, to 1,844.4 in the first 15 minutes of trading.

On Wednesday (local time), US stocks closed lower as investors absorbed various data showing the COVID-19 outbreak has hurt the world's largest economy.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell 1.86 percent, the S&P 500 was down 2.2 percent, and the Nasdaq Composite Index decreased 1.44 percent.

On the Seoul bourse, most large-cap shares were trading bearish.

Market kingpin Samsung Electronics lost 0.2 percent and SK hynix, a global chipmaker, was down 1.34 percent. No. 1 automaker Hyundai Motor shed 1 percent and POSCO, the country's leading steelmaker, declined 3.28 percent.

In contrast, major pharmaceutical firm Samsung BioLogics was up 0.55 percent, and major chem firm LG Chem jumped 3.06 percent.

The local currency was trading at 1,227.6 won against the US dollar, down 10.3 won from the previous session's close. (Yonhap)