Foreigners sell 2.9 bln USD of S.Korean stocks in 2015

Foreigners sold South Korean stocks for the first time in four years in 2015, offloading almost 3 billion U.S. dollars of stock holdings, financial watchdog data showed Thursday.

Foreign investors sold a net 3.5 trillion won (2.9 billion U.S. dollars) of local stocks in 2015, marking the first sales in four years, according to the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS).

Last year's sales pulled down foreign holdings of local stocks to 421 trillion won as of end-215, accounting for 29 percent of the total market capitalization.

British investors were the largest net seller, offloading 5.2 trillion won worth of shares. It was trailed by Saudi and Norwegian investors who sold stocks worth 4.7 trillion won and 1.4 trillion won each.

U.S. investors bought 9.9 trillion won of shares, while Singaporean and Japanese investors purchased stocks worth 1.6 trillion won and 1.3 trillion won respectively.

Meanwhile, foreigners made a net investment, or net bond buying minus maturing debts, worth 0.5 trillion won in 2015.

Foreign ownership of local listed bonds reached 101.4 trillion won as of the end of 2015. Endit