South Korea's KOSPI halted after a plunge of more than 8 percent, the seventh circuit breaker this year

South Korea's stock market faced heavy selling in semiconductor shares on Tuesday 28 July 2026. The Korea Exchange (KRX) said it activated its marketwide circuit breaker at around 10:14 a.m. Seoul time after the KOSPI plunged more than 8 percent from the previous session's close. Trading in KOSPI-listed shares was halted for 20 minutes.

The exchange said it was the seventh time this year that it has activated a circuit breaker. The selling was attributed to investor skepticism about heavy artificial intelligence spending by large technology companies. The same semiconductor selloff weighed on US index futures and made global risk sentiment more cautious, a backdrop that feeds into world gold and oil prices and from there into Iran's markets.