South Korean boy Kwon Joon with 43% gains is new retail trading icon

Watching the business news first thing is a new routine for 12-year-old South Korean Kwon Joon, as he dreams of becoming the next Warren Buffett after earning stellar returns of 43 per cent from a hobby picked up just last year: buying stocks. Kwon pestered his mother to open a retail trading account last April with savings of 25 million won ($22,400) as seed money, just as the benchmark KOSPI index began recovering from its biggest dip in a decade.

“I really talked my parents into it, because I believed an expert who was saying (on TV) that this is a once-in-a-decade opportunity,” said Kwon, who rode the steepest jump by year-end among MSCI’s country indexes. “My role model is Warren Buffett,” he added. “Rather than short-term focused day trading, I want to keep my investment for 10 to 20 years with a long-term perspective, hopefully to maximise my returns.”

South Korea’s rookie investors like Kwon, who pursues “value investing” in blue chip shares with funds garnered from gifts, trading mini-car toys and running vending machines, have led the blistering rise of retail trade amid the coronavirus pandemic.