Sudden circuit breaker triggered! Japanese and South Korean stock markets plunge

On March 9th, the South Korean KOSPI index opened sharply lower and continued to decline, falling over 8% as of press time. The Korea Exchange activated its KOSPI 200 futures circuit breaker mechanism after the index fell 5%, suspending algorithmic trading for 5 minutes. In individual stocks, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix both fell over 10%.

The Nikkei 225 index, as of press time, had fallen below 52,000 points, a drop of over 4,000 points, or over 7%, marking its largest decline since the sell-off triggered by US tariffs last April. Kaixia fell over 15%.