South Korean stocks fell 7% on Thursday on renewed selling in the chipmaker’s shares, after its central bank raised the much-anticipated interest rate for the first time in three years to stabilize the currency.

The benchmark KOSPI was down 502.44 points, or 6.90%, at 6,781.97 by 0113 GMT, more than erasing the previous session’s gains. The sharp drop also triggered a “sidecar” trading curb, temporarily halting program trading.

The Bank of Korea’s seven-member monetary policy board voted to raise the seven-day repo rate by 25 basis points to 2.75% to shore up the win, which has weakened about 3% against the US dollar this year.

The rate hike, predicted by all but one of 37 economists surveyed in a Reuters poll, aligns the BOK closely with regional neighbor ⁠Bank of Japan, which recently raised its own benchmark rate to a 31-year high.

It was last quoted at 1,487.6 per dollar on the onshore settlement platform, slightly below the previous nine-week high of 1,483.9 per dollar.

In equities, world-leading AI chipmaker SK Hynix tumbled 11.7%, while rival Samsung Electronics fell 8.9%. Battery maker LG Energy Solutions rose 1.79%.

SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics make up half of the benchmark KOSPI index.

Hyundai Motor and sister automaker Kia Corp were up 2.30% and 0.69%, respectively. Steelmaker Posco Holdings fell 0.48%, while drugmaker Samsung Biologics shed 0.51%.

Out of 904 issues traded, 433 shares advanced, while 429 declined. Foreigners were net sellers of 776.8 billion won of shares.

Despite recent losses and volatility, the KOSPI is up more than 62% so far this year, making it one of the best-performing indices globally.

In money and debt markets, September futures on three-year Treasury bonds rose 0.05 points to 102.86.

The most liquid three-year Korean Treasury bond yield fell 0.1 basis point to 3.858%, while the benchmark 10-year yield rose 1.9 basis point to 4.332%.