S.Korea surpasses UK to become eighth-biggest stock market
The total market capitalisation of Korean-listed companies has surged more than 45% in 2026 to $4.04 trillion, while Britain’s has jumped nearly 3% to $3.99 trillion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg
South Korea has surpassed UK to become the world’s eighth-biggest stock market, fuelled by a rally in its artificial intelligence-linked technology companies.
The total market capitalisation of Korean-listed companies has surged more than 45% in 2026 to $4.04 trillion, while Britain’s has jumped nearly 3% to $3.99 trillion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
The size of the British market was nearly double that of South Korea’s as recently as the end of 2024.
The surge in Korean stocks underscores the pivot towards companies linked to AI, which has driven gains in the country’s two biggest listed companies – Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix.
The two memory-chip behemoths now account for more than 40% of the total market cap of the benchmark Kospi index, which has more than 800 constituents.
A further tailwind has been provided by President Lee Jae Myung’s push to bolster equity prices via corporate governance reforms and pro-market policies.
The rapid ascent of Korea and Taiwan reflects a structural rebalancing in global equity markets, driven by their dominance in AI hardware rather than tactical asset allocation, said emerging markets and Asia Pacific investment specialist Francesco Chan at JPMorgan Asset Management in Hong Kong.
As the backbone of the AI supply chain – with a ‘super-cycle’ advantage in high-end foundries and memory – these economies are attracting sustained structural capital inflows, Chan said.
Britain’s FTSE 100 Index has gained nearly 4% in 2026, not much less than the MSCI All Country World Index, but well behind the supercharged gains of markets that have benefited from the AI boom.
The country’s equity market remains dominated by traditional sectors such as financials, consumer staples and energy-and-mining firms.
Forces such as the potential of AI, global defence spending and corporate governance reforms support a much steeper trajectory for Korean and Taiwanese equities than for Europe, said Patrick Kellenberger, an emerging-market equity strategist at Lombard Odier in Geneva.
He said: Europe continues to struggle with commercialising and scaling innovation. Creating the conditions for innovative firms to emerge and grow is critical – but also time-consuming.