SEOUL, April 18 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korean imports of Japanese seafood swelled nearly 21 percent in the first quarter of 2023 despite concerns over Tokyo’s planned release of contaminated water from its crippled nuclear power plant, government data showed Tuesday. Seoul imported US$48.6 million worth of fishery products from the neighboring country in the [...]
SEOUL, April 17 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s car exports surged more than 60 percent on-year to reach an all-time high in March on the back of solid demand for eco-friendly cars, data showed Monday. The value of outbound shipments of automobiles came to US$6.52 billion last month, up 64.1 percent from a year earlier, [...]
SEOUL, April 17 (Korea Bizwire) — “Suzume” has become the most-viewed Japanese film ever released in South Korea. Japanese director Makoto Shinkai’s latest animation broke the record set by the animation “The First Slam Dunk,” on Friday with 4.482 million admissions, according to data from the Korean Film Council. As of Sunday, “Suzume” gathered about [...]
SEOUL, April 13 (Korea Bizwire) — The number of foreigners working in South Korea’s agricultural industry spiked 531 percent on-year in the first quarter amid eased COVID-19 restrictions, data showed Thursday. A total of 8,666 foreigners came to South Korea for jobs in farming villages during the January-March period, sharply up from 1,373 foreign laborers [...]
SEOUL, April 12 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s job additions snapped their nine-month decline in March in the face of an economic slowdown, but most jobs were created for the over-60 age group, data showed Wednesday. The number of employed people came to 28.22 million last month, up around 469,000 from a year earlier, according [...]
SEOUL, April 11 (Korea Bizwire) — Large South Korean firms saw their interest expenses spike more than 50 percent in 2022 from a year earlier due to rising interest rates, a corporate tracker said Tuesday. The combined interest cost of 377 out of the country’s top 500 firms by sales stood at 39.9 trillion won [...]
SEOUL, April 10 (Korea Bizwire) — Foreign investors turned net sellers of South Korean stocks in March amid the collapses of Silicon Valley Bank in the United States and the global bank Credit Suisse, central bank data showed Monday. Offshore investors sold a net US$1.73 billion worth of local stocks last month, a turnaround from [...]
SEOUL, April 10 (Korea Bizwire) — More than half of major listed firms in South Korea saw their financial soundness worsen in 2022 amid high global interest rates and inflation, data showed Monday. The debt-to-equity ratio of 56 out of the 106 listed companies belonging to the country’s top 10 business groups increased last year [...]
SEOUL, April 9 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s superrich had an average of 32.3 billion won (US$24.5 million) of assets last year, and their yearly income came to about 1.23 billion won, a report showed Sunday. The Hana Institute for Finance, affiliated with major lender Hana Bank, defined the superrich in its report as those [...]
SEOUL, April 9 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s exports of instant noodles jumped 14.3 percent on-year in the first three months of 2023 to reach the highest figure for any first quarter ever amid the growing popularity of the Korean culture, data showed Sunday. The country exported US$208 million worth of instant noodles, or “ramyeon” [...]