Last year, the South Korean economy marked the slowest on-year growth pace in six years, amid shrinking corporate investment and slowing exports, central bank data showed Tuesday.Expanded government spending in the final quarter of the year was seen as having raised the annual figure to meet the government target level, while private sector remained sluggish, according to the bank.The country’s economy grew 2.7 percent on-year in 2018, down from 3.1 percent in the previous year, according

Economy Jan. 22, 2019

Market Jan. 21, 2019

Tension is apparently escalating between the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy and the Ministry of Economy and Finance -- South Korea’s two-largest economy-related departments -- as the latter recently gestured at expanding its financial leverage to take over the role of being the nation’s export policy headquarters.The Finance Ministry has recently become unusually vocal toward concerns over the slowing trend of key industries, such as semiconductors and petrochemicals, to whic

Economy Jan. 21, 2019

Local credit card operators are stepping up efforts to expand big data management and reinforce digital functions as they face the imminent markdown of their commission fees and a consequent decline in business margins, according to industry sources.The CEOs of major credit card service providers, expressing concerns over what they saw as a profit cliff situation, have vowed swift action to achieve a digital switchover and adopt big data-based marketing.“There is a growing sense of crisis

Market Jan. 18, 2019

South Korean biopharmaceutical company Celltrion has won an appeal case and successfully challenged the domestic patent of an original drug by Samsung Biogen, thereby clearing the way for sales of its up-and-coming biosimilar to treat autoimmune disorders, officials said Friday.The Patent Court of Korea on Thursday upheld a judgment by the Intellectual Property Tribunal, invalidating Samsung Biogen’s patent on Rituxan, an original drug used to treat chronic lymphocytic leukemia.The court decisio

Industry Jan. 18, 2019

South Korea’s state pension fund will actively exercise its rights as shareholder over the nation’s No. 1 air carrier Korean Air and its holding company Hanjin KAL Corp., the National Pension Service said Thursday.The decision is to mark the first of such case since the NPS introduced the stewardship code, a set of principles on trustee responsibility that allows the fund operator to intervene in the management of companies. (Yonhap)The fund management committee, the NPS' decision-making body, c

Industry Jan. 17, 2019

Standard Chartered Bank Korea, the local subsidiary of the British banking group, said Thursday that it has attracted an additional investment of 100 billion won ($89 million) from the group.In a directorate meeting held Wednesday, SC Bank Korea approved the capital restructuring resolution on issuing subordinated 10-year bonds worth 600 billion won and paying out an interim dividend totaling 500 billion won, the bank said in a press release. The subordinated bonds, once issued on Jan. 28, will

Market Jan. 17, 2019

The British parliament’s latest rejection of the government’s proposed Brexit deal is likely to have a limited impact on global financial markets as well as the South Korean economy, Seoul’s government said Wednesday.Vowing pre-emptive steps to counter a possible fallout, Korean authorities will work on preparations for a bilateral free trade deal with Britain, as the latter will no longer be subject to the Korea-EU Free Trade Agreement upon Brexit. “The vote to reject th

Economy Jan. 16, 2019

South Korea’s import prices fell for two consecutive months in December and reached an eight-month low, amid a prolonged fall in crude oil prices, central bank data said Tuesday. The import price index stood at 85.01 last month, down 3.4 percent from the previous month, according to preliminary data released by the Bank of Korea. This marked the lowest figure since the 84.80 observed in April last year.As a key reason behind the imports price fall the central bank cited a recent downtrend

Economy Jan. 15, 2019

Amid a low interest rate trend and real estate market boom, an increasing number of property purchasers here have turned to nonbank lending over recent years to dodge regulations, increasing volatility in the market, according to the latest report by the Korea Institute of Finance.“About 80 trillion won ($71.3 billion) of the domestic shadow banking market is highly subject to volatility, likely to face insolvency depending on the real estate market situation,” Shin Yong-sang, senior

Market Jan. 14, 2019

The volume of fixed deposits at local banks marked the steepest growth in eight years in 2018, on the back of increased policy rate and the banks’ efforts to reinforce liquidity, central bank data showed Sunday.The total balance for fixed-term deposits as of the end of last year stood at 668.4 trillion won ($599 billion), up 72.2 trillion won from a year earlier, according to the Bank of Korea.This on-year increase was the largest since the 95.7 trillion won observed in 2010, when the bank

Economy Jan. 13, 2019

Despite the widespread anxiety due to slowing growth momentum, the global economy is unlikely to face a recession this year, and high yield opportunities continue to exist in the US equity market and emerging markets, according to a US-based asset management company on Wednesday. “Growth momentum is certainly slowing down but when it comes to the question (of) whether such slowdown means a possible recession, our answer is no,” said David Wong, a senior investment strategist at Allia

Market Jan. 10, 2019

Samsung Electronics must pay 1.5 billion won ($1.34 million) in corporate tax, according to South Korea’s top court, which decided that the company’s patent-licensing deal with an Ireland-based conduit company was a tax-dodging attempt to exploit the special exemption clause in the Korea-Ireland tax treaty.The Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled against plaintiff Samsung Electronics, ending the five-year litigation filed by the tech giant in 2013 challenging tax authorities’ decision to hold it res

Industry Jan. 9, 2019

Tension prevailed at KB Kookmin Bank on Monday in the face of an imminent general strike that may dampen the company’s growth momentum and possibly menace its recently recovered position as the nation’s leading commercial bank.The bank’s labor union set out to stage a nationwide strike on Tuesday, as last-minute negotiations fell through on Monday afternoon amid prolonged conflict over the wage system. The walkout -- the first one in 19 years -- is expected to cripple operation

Market Jan. 7, 2019

Within this month the renewed calculation method for the legal minimum wage will be finalized, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Hong Nam-ki said Friday.“The government will announce its draft next week and confirm the final plan within January,” said the fiscal policymaker in a meeting of economic officials held at Seoul Government Complex. The government had recently gestured at partly adjusting the legal wage system, embracing the market’s backlash against the drast

Economy Jan. 4, 2019