President Choi Kyung-soo of the Korea Exchange, L, shakes hands with Chairman Lee Sush-dern of Taiwan Stock Exchange during their meeting on April 1 at KRX Seoul office to talk about mutual projects between the two stock exchanges.

The Korea Exchange said on Sept. 5 that it will hold a campaign event in Taipei to attract Taiwanese investors to the Korean stock exchange.

It will be the first such event to be held in Taipei by the Korea Exchange to inform Taiwanese investors of the Korean stock market. Director Lee Yong-kook will explain the ins and outs of the Korean bourses, especially with regard to its competitive strength in global terms, along with the KOSPI200 ETF to be listed on the Taiwanese stock exchange. At the present time, the Korea Exchange and the Taiwanese stock exchange have been in talks to allow the listing of each other’s stocks on their respective exchanges, with the KOSPI200 listed on the Taiwanese stock exchange and ETF listed on the Korean stock exchange.

The Korea Exchange team will hold one-on-one meetings with Taiwanese investors who want to know more about investing in Korean shares in what is called tailor-made investment attraction campaign at a special booth operated by the Korean stock exchange campaign team.

The Taiwanese stock exchange, Taiwan Index Co., and Yuanta Securities Co. in Taiwan will attend the Taiwan Day in Korea on Sept. 22. Various sideline events will explain the workings of the Taiwanese stock exchange, and they will take up various issues related to the event, with the Korean stock exchange delegation in Taipei and the development of joint projects for the application of IT in the operation of the stock exchanges, including Sector ETF and the Theme ETF related to dividends.

\The Korea Exchange plans to hold joint events and cooperative projects in marketing with stock exchanges in Asian countries including Japan and China, so that more foreign investors put money into the Korean stock exchange.

Korea’s stock markets extended trading hours by 30 minutes starting this month, the bourse operator said July 31, in a bid to add more vitality to the securities industry.

Starting Aug. 1, the markets for stocks and gold closed at 3:30 p.m., 30 minutes later, the Korea Exchange (KRX) said. The derivatives market will close at 3:45 p.m., instead of 3:15 p.m. The opening time of 9 a.m. will remain the same.

It marks the first time in 16 years the KRX will revise its trading hours. In 2000, the bourse operator abolished the one-hour lunch break. Market watchers said the extension was inevitable due to the sluggish growth of the local stock markets.

The Stock Market Division of Korea Exchange, formerly an independent South Korean exchange, was established in 1956. Some of its milestones include the launching of the Stock Index Futures Market in 1996 and the Stock Index Options Market in 1997, as well as the adoption of electronic trading in 1988, warrant trading in 2000, and equity options and ETFs in 2002. Its traded instruments include stocks, bonds, ETFs and REITs.

The Korea Exchange was established in 2005 as a merger of the Korea Stock Exchange, the KOSDAQ and the Korea Futures Exchange. The Korea Exchange is one of Asia's largest exchanges with around 1,800 listed companies.

The Korea Stock Exchange Composite KOSPI is a major stock market index which tracks the performance of all common shares listed on the Korean Stock Exchange. It is a capitalization-weighted index. The KOSPI Index has a base value of 100 as of January 4, 1980. The KOSPI is a major stock market index, which tracks the performance of large companies based in South Korea.

Director Lee Yong-kook of the Korea Exchange(KRX) introduces the 2016 7th Global ETF Conference to be held on Oct. 13 in Seoul.(Photos: KRX)