SEOUL, July 19 (Korea Bizwire) — As disposable income declines day after day, South Korean consumers are turning their eyes towards cheap refurbished products or near-expired products that are available at significantly discounted prices. Lotte Home Shopping Inc., a shopping unit of retail conglomerate Lotte, saw the average daily order volume of refurbished products rise [...]
SEOUL, July 18 (Korea Bizwire) — A new study has revealed that higher inflation rates lead to a higher rate of homicide. Cho Sung-won, an associate professor at Chosun University, recently published an article on how inflation impacts the four major crimes of murder, robbery, theft and assault in the Korea Criminal Intelligence Review. The [...]
SEOUL, July 18 (Korea Bizwire) — Consumers struggling with surging prices are increasingly limiting their purchases of products other than essential goods like food. The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy reported that last month’s offline retailer sales went up by 10.1 percent, while sales in the home appliances and culture sectors dropped by 9.7 [...]
SEOUL, July 15 (Korea Bizwire) – Foreign direct investment (FDI) pledges to South Korea fell 15.6 percent in the first half of this year from a year earlier amid global uncertainties caused by the prolonged crisis surrounding Ukraine and surging inflation, the industry ministry said Friday. The country received US$11.09 billion worth of FDI commitments [...]
SEOUL, July 15 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea said Friday it aims to provide policy financing worth 68.3 trillion won (US$51.4 billion) this year to small merchants and other vulnerable people in a bid to help ease the burden of rising borrowing costs. The move is a follow-up to the 125 trillion-won measure that was [...]
SEOUL, July 14 (Korea Bizwire) — President Yoon Suk-yeol instructed officials Thursday to find ways to protect ordinary citizens from the financial pressures of high inflation and high interest rates. Yoon made the remark a day after the Bank of Korea delivered an unprecedented 0.5 percentage-point rate hike in a preemptive bid to fight fast-growing [...]
SEOUL, July 13 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korean students studying abroad and their parents are taking the brunt of the weakening Korean won, as the home currency is hovering around the lowest level against the U.S. dollar in 13 years. After hitting a 13-year low of 1,301.8 won against the greenback on June 23, the [...]
SEOUL, July 13 (Korea Bizwire) — Sales of dosirak (Korean lunchbox) products such as dosirak boxes and thermal lunch boxes are growing as the number of people packing their own lunch is increasing due to high inflation. According to data from the online shopping mall Wemakeprice Inc., sales of dosirak products during the period from [...]
SEOUL, July 8 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea decided Friday to temporarily lift tariffs on seven more kinds of imported foodstuffs, including beef and chicken, in an effort to curb surging inflation and stabilize people’s livelihood. The government will remove tariffs on 100,000 tons of imported beef and 82,500 tons of chicken starting this month, [...]
SEOUL, July 6 (Korea Bizwire) — South Koreans in their 20s and 30s are struggling with rising interest rates. A majority of loans for jeonse (long-term deposits for rent), in particular, are provided at floating interest rates, which makes young South Koreans react to an increase in interest rates with concern or give up on [...]