Wall Street Breakfast Podcast: South Korean Markets Sliding

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South Korea stocks fall as president faces impeachment threat after martial law chaos. (00:23) Enemies to friends? Mark Zuckerberg (META) wants ‘active role’ in Trump’s tech policies. (01:41) Salesforce (CRM) climbs despite mixed Q3 results as Agentforce gains ground. (03:02)

This is an abridged transcript of the podcast.

South Korean stocks came under pressure on Wednesday after opposition parties submitted a motion to impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol over his short-lived declaration of martial law.

The benchmark Kospi (KOSPI) index fell as much as 2.3% and the Kosdaq slid 2%. Seoul-listed shares of Samsung Electronics, the country’s largest company, dropped 3% before recovering slightly to close 1.1% lower. Battery-maker LG Energy Solution and automaker Hyundai Motor fell over 2% each.

South Korea’s parliament, with 190 of its 300 members present, passed a motion early on Wednesday to lift the martial law that was declared Tuesday night. The speaker of parliament declared the martial law announcement invalid.

South Korea’s won (KRW:USD) slowly started recovering on Wednesday, a day after falling dramatically against the U.S. dollar on the president’s surprise declaration.

The martial law announcement triggered widespread protests and a political standoff as lawmakers opposed the move, escalating tensions in Asia’s third-largest economy.

In response, South Korea’s finance ministry assured markets of its readiness to inject “unlimited liquidity” to ensure stability if required.

Meta (NASDAQ:META) CEO Mark Zuckerberg is seeking an “active role” in tech policy discussions with the incoming U.S. administration indicating that relations between the executive and president-elect Donald Trump may be improving.

Nick Clegg, Meta’s (NASDAQ:META) global affairs president, told the media that Zuckerberg is keen to play “an active role in the debates that any administration needs to have about maintaining America’s leadership in the technological sphere.”

He went on to say that this “is tremendously important given all the geostrategic uncertainties around the world, and particularly the pivotal role that AI will play.”

Trump has largely been critical of Zuckerberg, after being banned from Facebook and Instagram in 2021 for praising his supporters who participated in the attack on the Capitol.

Zuckerberg in August committed to remaining neutral this election cycle. Trump even invited Zuckerberg to dine at the Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida last week, but it’s unclear what they discussed.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) is up 13.5% in premarket action after the company reported its third quarter fiscal 2025 financial results on Tuesday.

Despite somewhat mixed results and guidance, Salesforce demonstrated consistent growth in revenue and subscriptions, up 8% and 9% year over year, respectively.

“Agentforce, our complete AI system for enterprises built into the Salesforce Platform, is at the heart of a groundbreaking transformation,” said CEO Marc Benioff. “The rise of autonomous AI agents is revolutionizing global labor, reshaping how industries operate and scale. With Agentforce, we’re not just witnessing the future—we’re leading it, unleashing a new era of digital labor for every business and every industry.”

For the quarter ended October 31, Salesforce reported adjusted earnings per share of $2.41, which was less than the consensus estimate of $2.45. However, revenue of $9.44B was $90M more than the estimate. Salesforce indicated the lower-than-expected earnings per share was due to losses on strategic investments.

For the quarter in progress, Salesforce expects revenue ranging from $9.9B to $10.1B, which was less than the consensus of $10.5B. The company expects earnings per share ranging from $2.57 to $2.62, which was again less than the estimate of $2.65.