Korean retail investors’ aggressive leveraged bets on the market’s two dominant AI/Semi names - Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix - are now colliding with a sharp KOSPI correction, triggering the largest wave of forced stock sales in years and raising the specter of a self-reinforcing liquidation spiral.
At its peak last week, the benchmark KOSPI index was up 100% for 2026, rivaling the Nasdaq 100 Index’s 102% surge in 1999 - right before the bubble burst...
Last week we warned, as levered bets soared to record highs... that 'the signal is clear: the cash buffer eroding while active leverage refuses to unwind'.
And the concentration was extremely clear with 'new lows' dominating even as KOSPI hit record-er and record-er highs...
Driven purely by retail momentum chasers, as foreigners were fleeing...
We specifically made the point that the rise of leveraged exchange-traded funds, designed to magnify daily moves, may further intensify a reversal.
Fast forward a week - and sprinkle in some vicious moves in the Korean index (down 17% from the highs in a week) - and those warnings have now punched Korean retail investors in the mouth.
As The Korea Times reports, South Korean investors are facing massive forced liquidations and margin loans come due.
Aggregated over the last few trading sessions, the figure approached ~300 billion won (~$197 million) - the largest such reading in recent memory.
The ratio of forced sales to outstanding margin loans hit 9.1% on that Friday, the highest of the year.
These sales occur mechanically: investors who borrowed from brokerages (typically putting up 30–40% equity) must settle by T+2.
When equity falls below maintenance levels, brokerages automatically sell at the opening call auction - often locking in losses and adding downward pressure that can trigger further margin calls.
“The biggest risk during a sharp market decline is not the drop in prices itself, but forced liquidation,” said Kim Seok-hwan, an analyst at Mirae Asset Securities.
“Investors are advised to reduce leverage, hold more cash and focus on high-quality assets.”
And it is far from over as margin lending balances remain near record highs.
According to the Korea Financial Investment Association, outstanding margin loans climbed to a record 38 trillion won on May 29. Although the balance eased to 37.8 trillion won as of Monday, it remained at an elevated level.
“It is estimated that much of the recently increased margin financing entered the market when KOSPI was trading in the 8,200-8,400 range,” said Noh Dong-gil, an analyst at Shinhan Securities.
“Investors often begin trimming positions voluntarily once losses approach 15 percent, while the risk of forced selling rises significantly around the 20 percent loss level.”
This unwind is the direct consequence of retail investors aggressively piling into Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix using both traditional margin debt and the new wave of single-stock leveraged ETFs launched in late May 2026.
What began as a retail-driven, leverage-fueled melt-up concentrated in two AI stocks is transitioning into a classic de-leveraging event.
The new single-stock 2x ETFs and record margin debt have amplified both the upside and now the downside.
Foreign outflows have provided the fundamental counter-pressure, while mechanical forced sales are adding the accelerant.
Retail leverage that felt like genius in May is now being stress-tested in real time - with the Korean market’s extreme concentration making the moves especially violent.
Tyler Durden Wed, 06/10/2026 - 19:40Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times,
The U.S. southern border wall will be completed by the end of next year, said U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Commissioner Rodney Scott at an event on Tuesday.
Scott told an audience in Washington that the “primary border wall ... will be done by the end of 2027,” adding that there are a “couple of gaps.” The wall will stretch from San Diego to Texas near the Gulf of Mexico.
“The only places we’re not building a border wall is places where we’ve made a conscious decision that we don’t need it,” Scott said at the Center for Immigration Studies conference, adding that Big Bend National Park is an example of a “super remote area” with “some very, very high cliffs” that preclude construction of the wall.
Other parts of the border wall, including a secondary wall and a barrier in the Rio Grande, will be complete by July or August 2028, Scott said. The barrier will also be backed by electronic surveillance and other systems, he added.
The border wall, which was a campaign promise made by President Donald Trump during his 2016 presidential campaign, is designed to curb illegal immigration and drug trafficking into the United States.
But Scott said the wall isn’t enough to completely stop either one. Drug traffickers and human smugglers are using tunnels to find workarounds, he said.
“That is their business model, and drones definitely make it easier,” he said, adding, “They’re also smuggling narcotics across with drones.”
On the first day of his second term in January 2025, Trump signed an executive order directing the Department of War and Department of Homeland Security secretaries to “take all appropriate action to deploy and construct temporary and permanent physical barriers to ensure complete operational control of the southern border.” The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, approved by Congress in July 2025, included $46.5 billion for border wall construction.
Apprehensions of people crossing the border illegally in the Big Bend Sector fell 74 percent in fiscal 2025 compared with fiscal 2023, according to the CBP. Autonomous surveillance towers have also significantly reduced traffic, according to the agency.
Last month, the CBP released data marking a year of zero releases at the southern border, and apprehensions of illegal immigrants have dropped to their lowest levels in more than three decades.
The agency said that the Border Patrol recorded 8,943 apprehensions along the southwest border in April, a 94 percent decline from the monthly average under the Biden administration and 96 percent below the peak in December 2023.
Rodney Scott, commissioner for Customs and Border Protection, testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington on April 16, 2026. Madalina Kilroy/The Epoch Times
“The U.S. Border Patrol released zero illegal aliens into our country again this month, unlike April 2024, when more than 68,000 were released under President [Joe] Biden,” Scott said in a statement in May.
The Trump administration has also prioritized deporting illegal immigrants.
The White House’s border czar, Tom Homan, said in an interview in May that the administration is moving to increase deportations and that around 800,000 illegal aliens have been removed from the country since Trump took office again.
Tyler Durden Wed, 06/10/2026 - 19:15