South Korean stocks started off sharply higher Wednesday on an overnight Wall Street rally fueled by heightening anticipations of economic recovery, analysts said. 

The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) soared

15.84 points, or 0.79 percent to 2,032.45 in the first 15 minutes of trading. 

Shares moved upward across the board, with tech blue-chips and brokerage houses fueling the main index. Top-cap tech giant Samsung Electronics rose 1.23 percent and leading brokerage firm KDB Daewoo Securities jumped 2.5 percent. 

U.S. shares gathered ground on Tuesday, with the Dow Jones industrial average rising 0.89 percent to a record 14,253.77. 

The local currency was trading at 1,084.30 won against the U.S.

dollar as of 9:15 a.m., up 2.7 won from Tuesday's close. (Yonhap News)