quote: Interesting https://x.com/ThierryBorgeat/status/2082122773309071415 | South Korea has 52 million people and 102 million brokerage accounts. Every citizen, newborns included, holds two. Here is how a country got there. In 2016, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix together made up 16% of the Kospi. Today the two of them are more than 54%. Two chipmakers are more than half of a national stock market. Then AI needed memory. Since ChatGPT launched, SK Hynix is up more than 2,000%. Samsung more than 300%. The Kospi doubled in a single year, after taking two decades for the double before that. Then the money reached people. A Samsung memory worker on a $52,000 base salary is expecting a bonus near $410,000 this year. At SK Hynix, closer to $454,000. Roughly a decade of average Korean income, arriving in one payment. Luxury jewelry sales up 146% year over year. Watches up 85%. Imported car registrations up more than 40% in four months. Cartier boutiques running waiting lists. Rolex dealers sold out. Then it stopped being about spending. Koreans began surrendering insurance policies and liquidating savings to buy stocks. Margin loans hit a record 36 trillion won, about $26 billion, double a year ago. Brokerages raised margin rates toward 10%. Retail investors moved to bank credit lines instead. One civil servant posted his account online. 2.3 billion won, about $1.7 million, all of it in SK Hynix. $1.3 million of it borrowed. The Kospi has been halted seven times this year. One halt came after the entire index dropped 8% in a session. For two decades a 3% move was an event. Now it is a Tuesday. This month the flame reached the hand. On July 14, Samsung fell 10.70% and SK Hynix fell 15.37% in the same session. The Kospi traded above 8,000 in early July. It sits near 6,750 now. The businesses are still good. Memory is locked into multi-year contracts. The AI buildout is not fiction. None of the earnings were made up. This is not a Korean story. It is what happens anywhere money arrives faster than judgment. A great business survives the drawdown. The man who borrowed to own it does not.

quote: Interesting https://x.com/ThierryBorgeat/status/2082122773309071415 | South Korea has 52 million people and 102 million brokerage accounts. Every citizen, newborns included, holds two. Here is how a country got there. In 2016, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix together made up 16% of the Kospi. Today the two of them are more than 54%. Two chipmakers are more than half of a national stock market. Then AI needed memory. Since ChatGPT launched, SK Hynix is up more than 2,000%. Samsung more than 300%. The Kospi doubled in a single year, after taking two decades for the double before that. Then the money reached people. A Samsung memory worker on a $52,000 base salary is expecting a bonus near $410,000 this year. At SK Hynix, closer to $454,000. Roughly a decade of average Korean income, arriving in one payment. Luxury jewelry sales up 146% year over year. Watches up 85%. Imported car registrations up more than 40% in four months. Cartier boutiques running waiting lists. Rolex dealers sold out. Then it stopped being about spending. Koreans began surrendering insurance policies and liquidating savings to buy stocks. Margin loans hit a record 36 trillion won, about $26 billion, double a year ago. Brokerages raised margin rates toward 10%. Retail investors moved to bank credit lines instead. One civil servant posted his account online. 2.3 billion won, about $1.7 million, all of it in SK Hynix. $1.3 million of it borrowed. The Kospi has been halted seven times this year. One halt came after the entire index dropped 8% in a session. For two decades a 3% move was an event. Now it is a Tuesday. This month the flame reached the hand. On July 14, Samsung fell 10.70% and SK Hynix fell 15.37% in the same session. The Kospi traded above 8,000 in early July. It sits near 6,750 now. The businesses are still good. Memory is locked into multi-year contracts. The AI buildout is not fiction. None of the earnings were made up. This is not a Korean story. It is what happens anywhere money arrives faster than judgment. A great business survives the drawdown. The man who borrowed to own it does not.

Source:https://x.com/yoniassia/status/2082538429817008508