Korean companies’ stock issuances fell to their lowest level since the 2008-09 global financial crisis during the first half, signaling sluggish corporate fund-raising in the securities market.

According to the World Federation of Exchanges and Korea’s financial investment industry, the corporate initial public offerings were valued at $228 million in the local stock market for the first six months of the year.

The IPOs accounted for only 0.02 percent of the combined market capitalization worth $1.05 trillion on the nation’s bourses.

The figure marked a 59.6 percent drop from the same period last year, when the IPOs were valued at $564 million and took up 0.06 percent of the market capitalization.

The percentage, which plummeted to 0.004 percent in the first half of 2009 in the wake of the financial crisis, posted 0.85 percent in the first half of 2010 and 0.24 percent in the first half of 2011.

The issuance performance is much poorer than in other major overseas bourses. The New York Stock Exchange reported a 75 percent increase with IPOs totaling $15.9 billion in the first half. IPO fund-raising in Germany, Japan and Australia also increased in the same period.

“Though the number of IPO cases is similar to that of 2012, the bourses saw the value drop as the number of large-scale issuances declined this year,” a Korean stock market insider said.

By Kim Yon-se (kys@heraldcorp.com)