Seoul shares down

Seoul shares fell on Friday after investors were left disappointed by the lack of immediate policy action by the European Central Bank, following similar inaction from the US Federal Reserve. The Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) fell 1.11 percent to close at 1,848.68 points, managing to hold above support at the 60-day moving average of 1,841.91 points.
The ECB signalled that it may resume buying bonds to ease surging borrowing costs facing Spain and other fiscally challenged euro zone nations. But investors were left wanting for more after last week's bold comments from ECB chief Mario Draghi had the market's expectations running high. "Those expecting a quick-fire solution may have been disappointed, but on the brighter side, the ECB still appears ready to jump into the action if necessary ... the only thing that's changed is the issue of when, not if," said Lim Soo-gyun, an analyst at Samsung Securities.
The lack of monetary stimulus measures from the ECB hurt shares of banks. Hana Financial Group slumped 4.3 percent and Shinhan Financial Group fell 3.1 percent. Automakers also lagged, with Hyundai Motor down 2.3 percent and KIA Motors sagging 3 percent, pressured after sales data on Wednesday showed multimonth lows in global sales for South Korea's two leading automobile exporters.
STX Offshore & Shipbuilding bucked the market to gain 0.5 percent, after announcing it won a floating storage and offloading platform deal for a North African client, which local media speculate to be worth around 500 billion won ($442 million). LG Electronics jumped 5.2 percent after its US smartphone market share climbed one notch to fourth place in a ranking among competitors, according to market research firm Strategy Analytics (SA).
Risk-averse investors rotated into classic defensive plays such as telecoms, lifting SK Telecom shares 2.1 percent, while KT Corp rose 2.2 percent. The KOSPI 200 index of core stocks fell 1.3 percent while the junior, tech-heavy KOSDAQ edged down 0.3 percent.