6 foreign securities firms in South Korea see Q2 net profit soar 214% YoY, Morgan Stanley leads with approximately $148 million in net earnings

Odaily News: As the South Korean stock market rallied sharply in Q2 and the KOSPI broke through the 9000-point mark for the first time, six foreign securities firms—Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, UBS, Morgan Stanley, and Citigroup Global Markets—posted a combined net profit of 630.5 billion KRW (approximately $455 million) in South Korea during the second quarter, up 213.8% year-over-year and 133.3% quarter-over-quarter.

Among them, Morgan Stanley led with a net profit of 204.5 billion KRW (approximately $148 million), with only 87 employees in South Korea as of the end of June; Goldman Sachs reported a Q2 net profit of 137.1 billion KRW (approximately $98.9 million). During the same period, foreign investors' trading volume in South Korea's securities market reached 1,851.9 trillion KRW (approximately $1.34 trillion), up 312% year-over-year, and the significant surge in trading activity is considered one of the main factors driving the performance growth of foreign securities firms. (Econovill)