South Korean stocks traded higher late Tuesday morning, led by tech gains.
The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) had gained 33.76 points, or 1.28 percent, to 2,666.34 as of 11:20 a.m. The tech-heavy KOSDAQ had also jumped more than 1 percent.
The KOSPI opened higher, tracking overnight gains on Wall Street, and has stayed in positive terrain.
On Monday, all major U.S. stock indexes finished higher on upbeat corporate earnings and hopes for a soft landing for the U.S. economy.
In Seoul, most of big-cap shares rose across the board.
Market behemoth Samsung Electronics jumped 1.29 percent and leading chemical producer LG Chem gained 2.78 percent.
Leading battery maker LG Energy Solution rose 0.89 percent, and its smaller rival Samsung SDI gained 1.5 percent. POSCO Holdings and POSCO Future M also went up 1.4 percent and 0.76 percent, respectively.
Bio shares also gained ground, with Samsung Biologics soaring 4.7 percent and Celltrion advancing 2.8 percent.
IT stocks rose big, with Internet portal operator Naver jumping 3.96 percent and Kakao, the operator of the popular mobile messenger KakaoTalk, shooting up 6.24 percent.
Auto shares traded mixed.
Hyundai Motor gained 0.6 percent but its affiliate Kia lost 0.24 percent.
No. 2 chipmaker SK hynix fell 1.78 percent.
The local currency was trading at 1,281.5 won against the U.S. dollar at 11:20 a.m., down 6.9 won from Monday's close.
Source: Yonhap News Agency