KOSPI Plunges 14.5% as AI Credit Stress and Geopolitical Tensions Mount

The KOSPI's record-since-2008 slide is less about Korean equities than about AI-linked credit being repriced globally: QCP's CoreWeave-versus-Oracle CDS gap suggests the market is now discriminating between AI borrowers rather than treating the trade as one bloc. That transmission runs through memory-chip earnings, so Samsung and SK Hynix are the visible casualty of a funding-cost story. The energy backdrop — stalled Hormuz talks and shrinking U.S. strategic reserves — compounds the risk-off tone rather than causing it. Worth watching is whether credit spreads keep widening independently of equity moves, and whether Strategy's potential MSCI removal adds an index-flow layer to bitcoin demand.