South Korean stocks opened higher Friday on the back of overnight gains on Wall Street following abated woes over a possible tapering of quantitative easing moves by the U.S. Federal Reserve, analysts said.

The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) rose 26.65 points, or 1.35 percent, to 1,994.21 in the first 15 minutes of trading.

Shares gathered ground across the board, with market behemoth Samsung Electronics adding 1.62 percent and No. 1 carmaker Hyundai Motor rising 2.67 percent. Top steelmaker POSCO added 0.77 percent.

U.S. stocks closed higher Wednesday on the outlook that the U.S. central bank will not start the stimulus cut in December as widely speculated, with the Dow Jones industrial average adding 0.35 percent and the tech-laden NASDAQ composite index rising 0.18 percent.

The local currency was trading at 1,066.95 won against the U.S. dollar as of 9:15 a.m., up 0.95 won from Thursday's close. (Yonhap News)