Korea Reaches a New Milestone in Number of Foreign Individual Investors

Since the domestic capital market was open to foreign investors, it is the first time for the number of foreign private investors to reach 10,000. (image: Kobizmedia/Korea Bizwire)

SEOUL, South Korea, April 23, 2014 (Korea Bizwire) – The number of private investors who have bought Korea’s listed stocks and bonds has exceeded 10,000. Previously, all foreign investments have been made under institutional names from tax havens such as the Cayman Islands, Virgin Islands and Bermuda.

On April 22, the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) reported that the number of foreign private investors registered with the FSS was 9,988 at the end of March 2014. Considering that the figure was 9,958 at the end of February and 9,988 at the end of March, an increase of 30 in one month, the number is estimated to have already grown over 10,000. 

Since the domestic capital market was open to foreign investors, it is the first time for the number of foreign private investors to reach 10,000. The number of foreign private investors was only 421 at the end of 1991. The number was increased to 3,151 by the end of 1998 and first exceeded 5,000 by the end of 2002 (5,024).

The record has since been broken over and over to surpass 6,000 in 2006 (6,235), over 7,000 in (7,538), over 8,000 in (8,117), over 9,000 in 2011 (9,327), and eventually over 10,000 now. 

Most of the foreign private investors are from the countries in which many Koreans are located like the United States, Japan, Canada, Taiwan or China. At the end of last year, out of 9,904 foreign private investors, 4,389 were from the United States (44.3%), 2,143 from Japan, 694 from Canada, and 354 from China. 

There is no private investor among the foreign investors located in tax havens. At the end of last year, all 2,903 investors from the Cayman Islands as well as Luxembourg (1,480), the Virgin Islands (877), Bermuda (340) are registered as forms of organizations including banks, insurance companies, funds and pension funds. 

The total number of foreign investors was 38,168 at the end of last month, among which 28,180 are registered as institutions or organizations. There are 17,039 funds, 2,067 pension funds, 856 securities firms, 681 banks, 446 insurance companies, and 7,094 other organizations.

Written by Robin Koo (linguistkoo@koreabizwire.com)