The Kospi rose 3.56 percent as chip shares led a partial rebound

6,747.95. That is where South Korea's Kospi closed on Tuesday, up 231.68 points, or 3.56 percent, from Monday's close of 6,516.27, according to figures from Yonhap carried by the Korea Herald. Chips led it back. Samsung Electronics rose 6.15 percent to 259,000 won and SK Hynix rose 4.08 percent to 1,836,000 won, the two stocks that had led the index down the week before.

The bounce recovers only part of the selloff. On July 16 the Korea Exchange halted program selling after the Kospi opened down more than 4 percent and kept falling, and the index traded near 6,886 that morning, itself down from a close of 7,284.41 the day before. Tuesday's close sits below both marks. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index, the US benchmark that set the tone for Seoul, entered a bear market on July 18, down 20.2 percent from its June record.

Yonhap attributed the rebound to bargain hunting in semiconductors and to bullish memory-chip outlooks from global investment banks. The Associated Press, in reporting by Chan Ho-Him, put the same Kospi close at 6,747.95 and said Tokyo's Nikkei 225 also rose. No exchange notice of the day's close exists in a form that can be linked here, so the figures rest on the two wire reports, which agree.