Seoul shares rise on techs, banks; STX Enpaco jumps

* KOSPI rises 1.16 pct

* STX Enpaco rallies on its first trading day

* Hyundai Corp declines after stake sale falls through
(Updates to mid-morning)

By Jungyoun Park

SEOUL, May 15 (Reuters) - Seoul shares rose on Friday after a
positive finish on Wall Street with gains led by tech issues
including LG Electronics but Hyundai Corp (011760.KS) tumbled
after news a sale of a stake in the firm had fallen through.

The Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) was up
1.16 percent at 1,396.94 points as of 0218 GMT.

"The index's gains at its current level are limited as
investors are still looking for signs that the economy is not
just solidly at a bottom, but is near an upturn," said Yoo
Soo-min, a market analyst at Hyundai Securities.

The market is awaiting U.S. housing data due out early next
week which will be closely scrutinised, Yoo added.

Gains were led by techs, including LG Electronics
(066570.KS), which rose 3.69 percent as its earnings outlook for
the second quarter continued to strengthen.

"We are hearing that shipments of its handsets and household
electronics such as televisions have been quite strong this
quarter," said Chung Sung-ho, an analyst at KB Investment &
Securities, pointing to strong demand from China spurred by
government stimulus measures.

Banks also rose, tracking their U.S. peers and the S&P
financial index .GSPF, which rose 3.98 percent. KB Financial
Group (105560.KS) gained 4.0 percent and Woori Finance Holdings
(053000.KS) went up 4.33 percent.

Meanwhile, STX Enpaco (071970.KS), a ship engine parts making
unit of STX Group, was trading at 29,900 won per share, up by the
daily limit of 15 percent from its opening price of 26,000 won,
on its first trading day on the KOSPI.

Its opening price was also double the initial public offering
price of 13,000 won.

The company said in a filing to the Korea Exchange that it
planned to achieve 27 percent year-on-year growth in annual sales
to 1.3 trillion won ($1.03 billion), and 29 percent growth in net
profit to 66 billion won, for fiscal 2009.

"STX Enpaco will have no problem achieving those numbers. Its
main customer, STX Engine (077970.KS), is doing very well," said
Lee Ji-hoon, an analyst at SK Securities.

STX Engine on Friday said first-quarter net profit jumped 459
percent to 20.2 billion won from a year earlier.

But shares in Hyundai Corp (011760.KS) declined 3.79 percent
on news that banks scrapped an auction to sell a majority stake
in the trading and resource-development company to Hyundai Heavy,
the final bidder, due to a price gap. [ID:nSEO253494]

(Editing by Jacqueline Wong)