Seoul shares ended lower Monday, breaking their four-day winning streak amid profit-taking moves and lingering rate hike concerns. The South Korean won declined against the U.S. dollar.
After choppy trading, the benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index shed 9.3 points, or 0.35 percent, to finish at 2,619.
Trading volume was moderate at 540.02 million shares worth 11.48 trillion won (US$9.06 billion), with decliners outpacing gainers 511 to 370.
Institutions and foreigners offloaded a net 232.29 billion won and 200.39 billion won worth of stocks, respectively, while retail investors bought a net 426.80 billion won worth of shares.
Wall Street finished mixed Friday as U.S. Federal Reserve officials said it was too early to declare victory on inflation, indicating more rate hikes could come to bring inflation down to its 2 percent target.
The Fed is widely expected to raise its policy rate later this month, which would bring the rate to the 5.25-5.5 percent range.
In Seoul, most large-cap issues ended lower.
Market behemoth Samsung Electronics shed 0.14 percent to finish at 73,300 won, and No. 2 chipmaker SK hynix lost 0.68 percent to 117,200 won.
Top carmaker Hyundai Motor went down 2.4 percent to 203,500 won, and its sister company Kia declined 2.37 percent to 86,600 won. Major chemical company LG Chem shed 1.47 percent to 670,000 won.
Leading battery maker LG Energy Solution declined 0.74 percent to 538,000 won.
Among gainers, steel giant POSCO Holdings jumped 6.94 percent to 478,000 won, and POSCO Future M, the industrial materials unit of POSCO Holdings, advanced 0.87 percent to 404,500 won. Internet portal Naver rose 0.98 percent to 206,500 won.
The local currency closed at 1,266.6 won against the U.S. dollar, down 0.8 won from the previous session's close.
Bond prices, which move inversely to yields, closed higher. The yield on three-year Treasurys declined 0.3 basis point to 3.611 percent, but the return on the benchmark five-year government bonds went down 1.2 basis points to 3.619 percent.
Source: Yonhap News Agency