Foreign securities invested by South Korea's financial institutions retreated in the second quarter due to a fall in share prices of major investment destinations, data by the central bank showed Thursday.

Total overseas securities owned by domestic financial institutions, including banks, insurers and securities firms, reached an outstanding 54.4 billion U.S. dollars as of the end of June, down 2.2 billion dollars from three months earlier, according to the Bank of Korea (BOK).

The second-quarter fall came as the mark-to-market valuation of foreign stocks decreased amid declines in share prices of major investment destinations. Stocks in China dropped 10.0 percent during the second quarter, with those for Brazil, Japan and the European Union (EU) tumbling 15.7 percent, 10.7 percent and 8.6 percent each.

Holdings of overseas stocks contracted 2.63 billion dollars on- quarter to 26.85 billion dollars as of end-June. The contraction was mainly attributed to a fall in the mark-to-market valuation of foreign stock-type funds run by asset managers.

Foreign bond holdings increased 0.37 billion dollars to 14.38 billion dollars over the cited period due to purchases by asset managers and insurers, while those for Korean Paper grew 0.06 billion dollars to 13.21 billion dollars thanks to purchases by securities firms.

The Korean Paper refers to foreign currency-denominated securities sold overseas by the South Korean government, financial institutions and companies.