Amid the hacking incident of the Universal Subscriber Identity Module (USIM) at SK Telecom, the stock price of SK Telecom showed weakness while the scale of 'debt investment' increased more than fivefold.
According to Mirae Asset Securities on the 6th, the credit transaction loan balance of SK Telecom was reported at 15.086 billion won as of the 2nd. This marks a 5.3-fold increase compared to 2.845 billion won on the 22nd of last month, when the incident of the USIM hacking at SK Telecom was first disclosed.
The credit transaction loan balance surged from 2.473 billion won on the 29th of last month to 11.954 billion won on the 30th. It appears that investors, viewing the situation as a buying opportunity, engaged in debt investment. This is because the stock price of SK Telecom fell from 58,800 won on the 22nd of last month to 53,400 won on the 29th. The closing price of SK Telecom on the 2nd was 53,700 won, reflecting an estimated dividend yield of 6.5% for the year.
The proportion of short selling transactions, which had been concentrated, also slightly eased. Short selling, which involves selling borrowed stocks and then repurchasing them to return, indicates that the higher the proportion of short selling in the trading volume, the more investors believe that the stock price will decline. On the 28th of last month, the short selling accounted for 13.37% of the transaction volume, but it fell to the 1% range on the 29th and 30th. It was at 8.94% on the 2nd of this month.
However, securities firms believe that the USIM hacking incident at SK Telecom will take time to resolve. The investigation into the specific causes and extent of the leaked information is expected to be disclosed in 1 to 2 months.
Kim Jun-seop, a researcher at KB Securities, noted, "There are concerns that the market share of telecom companies could change depending on future response directions," and emphasized the need to monitor trends in the number portability subscribers of SK Telecom.