SEOUL, Feb. 28 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s central bank is expected to raise its key interest rate in May or July in an effort to cope with rising U.S. rates, analysts said Wednesday. In a widely expected move, the monetary policy board of the Bank of Korea (BOK) held the base rate steady at [...]
SEOUL, Feb. 23 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s short-term foreign debt rose sharply last year, with its ratio to the total reaching a five year high, the finance ministry said Friday. The country’s total external debt stood at US$418.8 billion at the end of last year, up $34.7 billion from a year ago, according to [...]
SEOUL, Feb. 19 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea will expand investment in food and agriculture companies with good growth potential to help tide them over during the challenges of their early development, the farm ministry said Monday. The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs said it will create a fund worth 50.5 billion (US$47.2 [...]
SEOUL, Feb. 19 (Korea Bizwire) — Money pouring into stock market funds reached new record highs as of late last month, on the strength of the recent market rally, financial data showed Sunday. The total held by investor deposits, money for derivatives trading, repurchase agreements (RP) account receivables for consignment, credit loans for stock investment [...]
SEOUL, Feb. 8 (Korea Bizwire) – South Korea’s four major financial holding firms saw their net profits rise last year as interest income increased, according to industry data on Thursday. The combined net profit of KB Financial, Shinhan Financial, Hana Financial and Woori Bank stood at 9.77 trillion won (US$8.98 billion) lastyear, up more than 30 percent from a year earlier. KB Financial’s net profit jumped 54.5 percent on-year last year, and [...]
SEOUL, Feb. 5 (Korea Bizwire) – South Korea’s two major banks are suspected of creating lists to give undue hiring favors to the families and acquaintances of influential figures, sources said Sunday. The Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) has recently filed complaints with the prosecution against five banks, including KEB Hana Bank and KB Kookmin Bank, [...]
SEOUL, Jan. 30 (Korea Bizwire) – South Korea began a real-name trading system for cryptocurrencies Tuesday, banning the use of anonymous bank accounts in transactions to prevent virtual coins from being used for money laundering and other illegal activities. The real-name trading system is also part of the government’s latest measures to curb speculative investment [...]
SEOUL, Jan. 29 (Korea Bizwire) — Stock values for stakeowners of biopharmaceutical companies nearly doubled over the past year, with Celltrion leading the pack, data showed Sunday. According to Chaebul.com, which tracks corporate records, 32 people each owned more than 100 billion won (US$93.76 million) worth of shares in biopharmaceutical firms as of Friday’s closing. [...]
SEOUL, Jan. 25 (Korea Bizwire) — Industrial Bank of Korea (IBK) said Thursday it will launch self-service shops during the latter half of the year amid growing non-face-to-face transactions. “We are sending some employees to Japan next month so they can look into self-service stores there to catch up with the growing proportion of non-face-to-face [...]
SEOUL, Jan. 24 (Korea Bizwire) — The amount of crowdfunding in South Korea soared about 60 percent last year, data showed Wednesday, signaling the platform grew as an effective financing option for startups. According to the data by the Financial Services Commission (FSC), 183 companies raised a combined 27.8 billion won (US$25.9 million) last year, [...]