Asia-Pacific markets finished mostly lower at the close of the week, with South Korea among the region’s weakest performers. On Oct. 30, the KOSPI fell 206.92 points, or 3.48%, to 5,730.74 after touching 5,599.42 intraday, while the KOSDAQ dropped 3.83% to 724.38. Uncertainty over global technology earnings, expectations for prolonged U.S. Federal Reserve tightening and foreign-exchange volatility weakened investor sentiment. Foreign investors sold a net 1.6173 trillion won ($1.21 billion) in KOSPI shares and 26.7 billion won in KOSDAQ shares, while institutions sold 742.6 billion won and 137.5 billion won, respectively. Individuals bought 621 billion won in KOSPI shares and 168.7 billion won in KOSDAQ shares. Semiconductor stocks led losses, with Samsung Electronics down 3.02% to 225,000 won and SK hynix down 7.08% to 1,418,000 won. The won strengthened for a second consecutive session, closing at 1,334.3 per dollar, up 2.5 won, as exporter dollar sales and market-stabilization efforts offset global dollar strength and demand linked to foreign equity sales.