SEOUL, April 30 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korean public firms’ liabilities rose for the fourth straight year last year to hit another record high as they borrowed more to make investments amid the economic recovery, the finance ministry said Friday. Of 350 state-run companies, the combined debt of 347 firms reached 583 trillion won (US$463.4 [...]
SEJONG, March 29 (Korea Bizwire) — Debt held by wage workers in South Korea grew at a much faster pace in 2020 from a year earlier amid the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, data showed Tuesday. Bank and non-bank loans extended to paid workers in Asia’s fourth-largest economy averaged 48.6 million won (US$39,800) per person [...]
SEOUL, March 15 (Korea Bizwire) — Debt among the “MZ generation,” a Korean term referring to those aged between late 10s and 30s, widened at a faster rate than income compared with 20 years ago, a central bank report showed Tuesday. The “MZ generation” refers to a pairing of two groups — millennials born between [...]
SEOUL, Dec. 21 (Korea Bizwire) — More than half of South Koreans aged between 40 and 64 held debt last year as more people took out loans to buy homes amid skyrocketing housing prices, data showed Tuesday. The data by Statistics Korea showed that 56.5 percent of people in the age group borrowed money from [...]
SEOUL, Dec. 2 (Korea Bizwire) — The government plans to establish a legal support system to protect adolescents who lack legal awareness from going bankrupt due to the debts inherited from parents. The Ministry of Justice said Wednesday that it will preemptively identify teenagers who need legal advice related to inheritance and provide them with [...]
SEOUL, June 29 (Korea Bizwire) — The self-employed’s debts grew 3.1 percent in 2019 from a year earlier as their income declined amid an economic slowdown, data showed Tuesday. Financial institutions’ loans extended to the self-employed averaged 172 million won (US$151,800) as of end-2019, compared with 167 million won the previous year, according to the [...]
SEOUL, May 13 (Korea Bizwire) — The living conditions of low-income South Koreans have not improved over the past 10 years. Income polarization accelerated during this period as the income of the upper 20 percent increased sharply, dwarfing the marginal increase in the income of the bottom 20 percent. Statistics Korea’s household trend survey showed [...]
SEOUL, April 5 (Korea Bizwire) — Nearly a quarter of companies in South Korea failed to pay the interest on their debts in 2020 despite an overall rise in corporate earnings, a report said Monday. A total of 255 listed firms in Asia’s fourth-largest economy had an interest coverage ratio of less than 1 last [...]
SEOUL, March 24 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korean low-cost carriers (LCCs) are struggling with high indebtedness stemming from huge deficits due to the coronavirus pandemic, data showed Wednesday. The debt-to-equity ratio of three major LCCs — Jeju Air Co., Jin Air Co. and T’way Air Co. — ranged from 430 percent to 517 percent as [...]
SEOUL, Jan. 22 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s finance ministry has increasingly found itself in hot water over growing calls to dig deeper into state coffers in response to the pandemic-caused economic slump, as it is wary of the country’s ballooning debt. A row over the finance ministry’s fiscal role reignited this week after Prime [...]