South Korea's KOSPI briefly rose above 7,200 on Aug. 18 and reached its highest intraday level in a month before reversing to close at 6,869.83, down 108.11 points, or 1.55%, ending a five-session winning streak. Early gains were supported by chip shares after the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index rose 1.6% overnight, but momentum faded as government bond yields climbed and foreign buying slowed during the session. Near the close, foreign investors' net buying had narrowed to 46.7 billion won from 1.5204 trillion won through 9:52 a.m., while Korea Exchange end-of-day data later showed net foreign purchases of 86 billion won on Aug. 18, extending a net-buying streak that began on Aug. 11 to five straight sessions totaling 8.156 trillion won. About 87% of that five-session inflow went to Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, which rose 16.74% and 17.04% from their Aug. 10 closes, although Samsung fell 2.19% and SK Hynix rose 1.03% on Aug. 18. The Kosdaq dropped 3.52% to 834.20 and the won weakened to 1,413.20 per dollar.