[SEOUL] South Korea's KOSPI stock index was little changed on Thursday. The Korean won gained while bond yields were down.

At 01:20 GMT, the KOSPI was down 1.82 points, or 0.08 per cent, at 2,417.47.

Hyundai group shares were mixed after their parent group announced a plan to streamline its complex ownership structure. Shares of Hyundai Glovis surged by as much as 24 per cent and Hyundai Mobis fell nearly 8 per cent soon after opening.

The won was quoted at 1,066 per dollar on the onshore settlement platform , 0.45 percent firmer than its previous close at 1,070.8.

A South Korean government official said that disclosing details of actions taken by currency authorities is likely to ease concerns about the country being labelled a "currency manipulator" by the United States, lending some support to won.

In offshore trading, the won was quoted at 1,066.3 per US dollar, down 0.26 per cent from the previous day, while in one-year non-deliverable forwards it was being transacted at 1,053.05 per dollar.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 0.16 per cent, after US stocks ended the previous session with losses . Japanese stocks rose 0.74 per cent.

The KOSPI is down around 2.0 per cent so far this year, and down by 2.35 per cent in the previous 30 days.

The current price-to-earnings ratio is 12.10, the dividend yield is 1.28 percent and the market capitalisation is 1,242.04 trillion won.

The trading volume during the session on the Kospi index was 117,475,000 shares, and of the total traded issues of 876, the number of advancing shares was 354.

Foreigners were net sellers of 119,683 million won worth of shares.

The US dollar has fallen 0.01 percent against the won this year. The won's high for the year is 1,056.67 per dollar on Jan. 14, 2018 and low is 1,098.4 on Feb. 6, 2018.

In money and debt markets, June futures on three-year treasury bonds rose 0.01 point to 107.68.

The Korean 3-month Certificate of Deposit benchmark rate was quoted at 1.65 per cent, while the benchmark 3-year Korean treasury bond yielded 2.224 per cent, higher than the previous day's 2.22 per cent.

REUTERS