KOSPI SINKS NEARLY 6% ON CHINA CHIP THREAT

South Korea's KOSPI index fell 5.86% to 6,010.38 on Tuesday, dragged down by its two biggest chipmakers. Samsung Electronics dropped more than 6% and SK Hynix slid over 8% after Chinese rival ChangXin Memory Technologies said it made progress on next-generation DRAM technology, raising fears Beijing is closing the memory-chip gap that underpins AI servers. The rout rattled the global semiconductor trade tracked by $SOXX, erasing billions in value from the suppliers of high-bandwidth memory to Nvidia and other AI chipmakers.