Won Opens Higher After Sliding Yesterday

The won has strengthened at the open, USD/KRW last -1.95 at 1105.70 – the rate briefly popped over 1100 yesterday.

• South Korea's Finance Minister Hong Nam-Ki on the wires, saying South Korea needs to keep expansionary fiscal and monetary policy, Hong attending a meeting with Bank of Korea governor Lee to discuss the economy and financial markets.
• The won was the worst performer in Asia yesterday and has fallen 2% since the start of the year. Some of this is attributed to outflows from domestic assets. According to figures compiled by Bloomberg domestic investors were net buyers of foreign assets to the tune of $6.2bn, the highest since records began in 2011. The issue was compounded by foreign funds selling a net $5.3bn of South Korean stocks.
• There could be headwinds for the won from new COVID-19 cases, South Korea reported 621 new coronavirus cases over the last 24 hours, in line with the previous day, and a notable jump from around 350 last week. While the number of confirmed cases show a rising trend since after the LNY a healthy ministry official said it's "hard to judge" whether this is due to a temporary phenomenon on more testing or whether it's a resurgence of the 3rd wave.