As the National Growth Fund steps up support for sovereign AI, bio and secondary battery sectors, investors are continuing to look for beneficiary stocks.

The Korea Exchange said on Tuesday that related shares are drawing attention as the fund’s disclosure of a second mega-project coincides with the KOSPI’s record-high trend.

The National Growth Fund’s fund management deliberation committee approved five items on April 30, including direct investment, infrastructure investment and financing, and low-interest loans. The recipients are Upstage, the National AI Computing Center, Future Graph, STGen Bio and Foosung.

With the latest approvals, the fund has approved 11 projects cumulatively through April. The cumulative approved amount is about 8.4 trillion won. As the government injects policy funds into advanced strategic industries such as artificial intelligence, bio, secondary batteries and semiconductor materials, related companies could see faster facility investment and supply chain internalisation.

POSCO Future M is being cited as the most direct beneficiary. Its unit Future Graph will receive 250 billion won in low-interest loans to build a plant at the Saemangeum Industrial Complex to produce spherical graphite, a key intermediate material for anode materials.

Spherical graphite is a key material needed to produce natural graphite anode materials. The government expects the support to help establish an annual production base of 37,000 tons of spherical graphite and about 33,000 tons of natural graphite anode materials. For POSCO Future M, the project is directly linked to internalising its anode material value chain for secondary batteries.

In the bio sector, Dong-A Socio Holdings is classified as a direct beneficiary candidate. STGen Bio, a support recipient, is Dong-A Socio Holdings’ biopharmaceutical contract manufacturing unit and an unlisted company that runs a biosimilar contract development and manufacturing business.

At the fund management deliberation committee meeting, it approved 85 billion won in low-interest loans to expand a biosimilar production plant.

STGen Bio plans to expand facilities for producing active pharmaceutical ingredients and finished drugs. Once the expansion is completed, maximum production capacity for active pharmaceutical ingredients is expected to rise 44% and for finished drugs 170%.

The theme could also spread across the broader bio and secondary battery materials sectors. Biosimilar and CDMO-related companies such as Samsung Biologics and Celltrion could see investment sentiment improve in line with policy direction.

In semiconductor materials, Foosung is a direct support recipient. Foosung, a producer of high-purity hydrogen fluoride gas in Ulsan, received approval for 16.5 billion won in low-interest loans to expand production capacity for key materials used in semiconductor processes.

In AI, Naver and Samsung SDS are drawing attention together. The National Growth Fund approved 400 billion won in low-interest loans on April 15 for Naver’s expansion of AI data centres and the introduction of graphics processing unit servers.

The National AI Computing Center is an infrastructure project to be built with more than 15,000 GPUs. Samsung SDS is the lead company of a consortium pushing to build the centre. Naver Cloud and others are known to be participating in the consortium.

That makes Naver and Samsung SDS the most direct beneficiary candidates in AI infrastructure. Kakao and KT are also cited as possible indirect beneficiaries from the spread of sovereign AI and the cloud ecosystem.

Brokerage industry views suggest that investors should first check ownership ties with supported companies, business relevance and whether funds actually flow in when looking at stocks related to the National Growth Fund.

That is because the basis for benefits is relatively clear for companies receiving direct support, or parent companies of unlisted support recipients, while peers or theme stocks may reflect expectations first.

Kang Jin-hyuk (강진혁), an analyst at Shinhan Investment Securities, said, "The National Growth Fund’s second-round projects cover next-generation bio and vaccine facility construction and R&D, organic light-emitting diodes, future mobility and defence, sovereign AI, renewable energy and the Saemangeum advanced belt."

He added, "As products are scheduled to be launched in May, individual funds are expected to continue to flow in along with market recovery."