South Korea’s blue-chip bellwether Samsung Electronics Co. is on upward swing on foreign buying spree, nearing all-time high and valuing more than the entire secondary Kosdaq market following better-than-expected second-quarter performance.

The company’s stock price is climbing towards the peak of 1,584,000 won ($1,393.9) set in January 2013, finally breaking the tedious box range around 1.5 million won for the last three and half years.

Shares of Samsung Electronics closed 1.75 percent lower at 1,516,000 won Friday.

Samsung Electronics’ stock value began to rise in early June as foreign investors started to purchase the company’s shares after it completed its share buyback that was initiated in the fourth quarter of last year.

According to its disclosure, Samsung Electronics purchased a total of 4.25 trillion won worth of its own shares between Oct. 30, 2015 and Jan. 12, and another 3.12 trillion won worth between Jan. 29 and April 14. Samsung Electronics in October last year announced share buyback plan to improve shareholder value. During these two periods, foreign investors net sold 3.3 trillion won worth of Samsung Electronics shares to take profit.

They returned attention to Samsung Electronics shares early June when China’s American Depositary Receipts (ADR) joined Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) emerging markets index.

According to Korea Exchange, foreign investors net purchased 759.9 billion won worth of Samsung Electronics shares between June 1 and July 20, second largest after Samsung Electronics.

Last week, Samsung Electronics disclosed that it has bought treasury shares of 2.13 trillion won from April 29 to July 12.

The company received traction from the second-quarter earnings after it beat expectations and earned $7 billion during the period. Profit rate from smart phone division that hovered at 10 percent recovered to the 16 percent range in the second quarter.

The latest stock price rally has bolstered the stock’s market value to 220.6 trillion won, making it bigger than 1,155-strong Kosdaq market capitalization of 215.18 trillion.

By Han Ye-kyung and Yong Hwan-jin

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