Oct 16, 2026 · 23 min · 8 segments
On this week’s episode of the Korea Pro Podcast, John and Joon Ha discuss the sharp decline in South Korea’s stock market, with the KOSPI plunging nearly 8% on Thursday amid concerns about the…
John LeeHost
Joon-ha ParkHost
Jeongmin KimHost
And the reasons that it plunged several months back and plunging again today, they're almost identical except for one little bit of a difference.
But as you pointed out, yeah, it- it's not looking great for those investors or anyone, whether you're a stockbroker or a regular retail investor or whoever.
At this point, I'm pretty sure that the Korea Exchange should really start issuing helmets and seat belts to everyone, because this is a bumpy ride.
Right, and speaking of, you know, seat belts and helmets, you got Samsung Electronics, and, you know, SK Hynix, who we've been singing their praises for the past year or so, but it fell 9.7%, and also SK Hynix declined 11.35%.
Samsung announced that their third-quarterly operating profits was around $80 billion, and which is nine times higher than it was last year.
Firstly, if we go back to the Samsung number, $80 billion, humongous, but it still did not beat market expectations.
When it comes to the AI market, when it comes to chips and everything, people have been talking about is the cycle turning? Because this is a very cyclical market.
So if Samsung announces this lower than expected operating profits, does this mean that maybe we are beginning to see diminishing marginal returns? Is this the beginning of that cycle? And so people are a little freaked out about that, and there are also people who are worried about just how much money all of these hyperscalers in America are spending, whether we're talking about OpenAI, Anthropic, or Amazon.
These companies are spending massive amounts of money in data centers to try to power their AI programs, right? And people are saying, "Hey, these are a lot of money that you're investing in.
Can you actually stay in business in, say, three, two years with all the money that you're spending?"
And the reasons that it plunged several months back and plunging again today, they're almost identical except for one little bit of a difference.
But as you pointed out, yeah, it- it's not looking great for those investors or anyone, whether you're a stockbroker or a regular retail investor or whoever.
At this point, I'm pretty sure that the Korea Exchange should really start issuing helmets and seat belts to everyone, because this is a bumpy ride.
Right, and speaking of, you know, seat belts and helmets, you got Samsung Electronics, and, you know, SK Hynix, who we've been singing their praises for the past year or so, but it fell 9.7%, and also SK Hynix declined 11.35%.
Samsung announced that their third-quarterly operating profits was around $80 billion, and which is nine times higher than it was last year.
Firstly, if we go back to the Samsung number, $80 billion, humongous, but it still did not beat market expectations.
When it comes to the AI market, when it comes to chips and everything, people have been talking about is the cycle turning? Because this is a very cyclical market.
So if Samsung announces this lower than expected operating profits, does this mean that maybe we are beginning to see diminishing marginal returns? Is this the beginning of that cycle? And so people are a little freaked out about that, and there are also people who are worried about just how much money all of these hyperscalers in America are spending, whether we're talking about OpenAI, Anthropic, or Amazon.
These companies are spending massive amounts of money in data centers to try to power their AI programs, right? And people are saying, "Hey, these are a lot of money that you're investing in.
Can you actually stay in business in, say, three, two years with all the money that you're spending?"
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