“I had 500 million won in Samsung Electronics, but I bought a house and lost 2 billion”—FOMO explodes as KOSPI surges

https://n.news.naver.com/article/016/0002640138

On the morning of the 7th, as the KOSPI surpassed the 7,500 mark and hit an all-time intraday high, KOSPI-related news is being displayed in the Hana Bank dealing room in Jung-gu, Seoul. Reporter Yoon Chang-bin.

(Omitted)

This comes just one day after the index crossed the 7,000 mark for the first time yesterday. Among office workers, a sense of FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) is spreading, with many feeling that "I'm the only one falling behind."

On the office worker community Blind, a post titled "I bought a house in October '25 and it's so hard" was uploaded on the 6th. Blind is a platform where users must verify their identity using an official company email to join.

The author, Mr. A, stated that in October last year, he borrowed 900 million won—including a minus bank account (overdraft line of credit) and loans from his parents—to purchase an old apartment in Gongdeok-dong for 1.8 billion won.

Mr. A lamented, "The house price has gone up by about 100 million won, but if I had just held onto the 500 million won worth of Samsung Electronics stock I had in August '25, it would have become 2 billion won by now."

He calculated that if he had left the stocks alone instead of spending three months visiting 30 different properties for real estate inspections, he would have had 2 billion won without any debt. Currently, his monthly principal and interest repayment is 3.8 million won; after paying this from a single-income take-home pay of 6.5 million won, he is left with 2.7 million won.

Netizens reacting to the post were divided, with some saying, "Even if you bought at 50,000 and sold at 100,000, holding on until 100,000 was already a good move," or "People with an average price of 50,000 usually sell around 70,000 to 80,000. Would anyone really leave 500 million untouched until they hit a 300% return?" Another netizen commented, "Talking in hindsight is meaningless."

The FOMO trend is clearly visible across the overall stock market. After breaking the 5,000 mark on January 27, the KOSPI surpassed 7,000 in about three months. AI-related sectors led the surge during this period. On the 6th alone, there were 200 rising stocks on the KOSPI, but 679 falling stocks. This means that even on days when the index rose, many investors' accounts were not "in the red" (profitable).

The scale of "debt-investing" (investing using borrowed money) is breaking records. According to the Korea Financial Investment Association, the balance of credit loans in the domestic stock market exceeded 36.0682 trillion won as of the 29th of last month, hitting an all-time high. It swelled by more than 8.6 trillion won in three months from 27.4 trillion won in January.

Source: https://theqoo.net/hot/4193183896