Nearly half of foreign companies with branches in South Korea have no plans to recruit university graduates this year, a survey showed on Wednesday. A survey of 58 foreign firms conducted by the online recruiting agent JobKorea found that 26, or 44.8 percent, do not have plans to hire any new graduates this year. Of the remainder, 24 companies responded that they will be looking for new employe...

Hyundai Steel on Wednesday further raised the export price of bar and section products by up to $50 per metric ton. With the changes, H-shape section steel has been raised to between $800 and $810 per ton, including freight costs, for the Middle East and Southeast Asia, respectively. Products bound for Europe and the U.S. will be priced at between $830 and $840 per ton in line with the changes ...

Toyota Motor Corp.’s Lexus outsold Bayerische Motoren Werke AG’s BMW and Daimler AG’s Mercedes-Benz last month, helping the Japanese brand secure the top spot in U.S. luxury auto sales for the 11th straight year. Lexus sold 27,560 cars and sport-utility vehicles in December in the U.S. and 229,329 for 2010, the Toyota City, Japan-based automaker said Tuesday in a statement. The brand’s sales fel...

WASHINGTON (Yonhap) -- South Korea's Hyundai Motor Co. notched record sales in the United States last year amid a surging auto market in the world's biggest economy after the worst recession in decades. Hyundai Motor America (HMA) sold 538,228 vehicles in 2010, up 24 percent from a year earlier and an all-time sales and market share record, HMA said in a statement. Hyundai's affiliate Kia Motor...

Samsung Group, South Korea's top family-owned conglomerate, said Wednesday that it will spend a record 43 trillion won (US$38.3 billion) in capital expenditures this year to cement its market dominance and speed up a search for new growth engines. The figure represents an 18 percent increase from the 36.5 trillion won invested in new plants and equipment last year, according to the group. (Yonh...

Daewoo International Corp., a Korean trading firm, said Tuesday that it has signed a $30 million deal to supply buses powered by compressed natural gas to Bangladesh. Under the deal with the Bangladesh Road Transport Corporation, Daewoo International will ship 255 CNG buses and necessary spare parts by July. The deal was partly financed by Korea’s Economic Development Cooperation Fund, the trad...

Samsung Electronics Co., the world's top computer memory maker, will likely spend more than 30 trillion won ($26.67 billion) in investment this year, industry sources said Tuesday. The forecast came a day after company chairman Lee Kun-hee said that the company's investment for this year will be larger and bigger than last year's. The company earmarked 26 trillion won (US$23 billion) for invest...