South Korea’s stock market saw a combined 498 trillion won ($428 billion) worth of short selling transactions from 2015 to 2019, but a high bar exists for retail investors wishing to engage in the practice, a lawmaker said Monday. Ruling Democratic Party Rep. Lee Jung-mun said retail investors need greater access to short selling, and called for the introduction of legislation before the temporary ban on the short selling of listed shares here expires in March 2021. The annual volume o

Market Oct. 5, 2020

After recent success in the market for Seoul office space, London-based investment firm Actis is looking to further invest in Seoul area real estate, this time with a focus on industrial assets. The company is among those looking to invest in data centers in South Korea, as demand spikes. As server requirements expand beyond what companies can accommodate in their main offices, firms are looking to relocate their servers to the cloud or a third-party facility. Both options require data cente

Market Oct. 4, 2020

Policy lender Korea Development Bank Chairman Lee Dong-gull said Monday that he is closely reviewing SsangYong Motor‘s fate as a sustainable automaker while refraining from mentioning its plan to provide financial assistance to the cash-strapped company. The focal point of SsangYong Motor must be “sustainability of business operations,” along with the shareholder‘s responsible actions and burden-sharing of all parties concerned, such as shareholders, the company and the

Market Sept. 28, 2020

A ban on short selling shares on Korean bourses for most investors curtailed the practice by nearly 97 percent, data showed Monday. Institutional investors in South Korean stock market short sold 20.4 billion won ($17.4 million) worth of stocks a day on average from March 16 to end-August, according to data obtained by Democratic Party Rep. Park Kwang-on from the watchdog Financial Supervisory Service. That was down from 654.2 billion won a day from January to March 13.　 Certain authorized i

Market Sept. 28, 2020

Korea Investment & Securities, a Seoul-based brokerage house, said Sunday that it has started selling a new product to indirectly invest in equities of global companies dedicated to infrastructure projects in developed countries. The new product is a feeder fund of the Global Listed Infrastructure Fund by Sydney-based First Sentier Investors. Local investment firm Kiwoom Asset Management is an underlying manager of the structured investment product. The product for South Korean end-inves

Market Sept. 27, 2020

The Export and Import Bank of Korea and International Finance Corp. have agreed to expand their collaboration in developing countries and to link Korean firms with more opportunities overseas, the financial institutions said Sunday. The two signed a new memorandum of understanding on Friday to focus on creating new jobs, promoting smart cities and boosting health care, among other measures to identify and finance projects in countries largely in Southeast and Central Asia. The collaboration wi

Market Sept. 27, 2020

Korean children have received a combined 1.3 trillion won ($1.1 billion) worth of assets through some 9,700 gifts that are subject to taxation, data showed Wednesday. The value of the combined assets as of 2018 -- comprising of financial assets, properties and securities -- surged over twofold from that of 2014 at 588.4 billion won, according to data from the National Tax Service compiled by ruling Democratic Party Rep. Yang Hyang-ja. In the same period, the number of taxable gifts rose 92 per

Economy Sept. 23, 2020

The National Pension Service, South Korea‘s public pension fund, has entered into a strategic cooperation with Singapore-based Keppel Capital to beef up private infrastructure investment in Asia. According to the investment arm of offshore rig builder and shipbuilder Keppel, the strategic cooperation is meant to foster capabilities to manage energy and environmental infrastructure assets, including renewables and related technology solutions, urban development and connectivity solutions.

Market Sept. 22, 2020

Shares of Hanwha Solutions plunged Monday immediately after electric vehicle developer Nikola announced a leadership shakeup, as it faces a heap of fraud allegations and an upcoming probe. Hanwha Solutions common shares retreated 7.4 percent Monday, while its preferred stocks dipped 10 percent. Hanwha Solutions, a Seoul-based petrochemical arm of the Hanwha conglomerate, indirectly controls a minority stake in Nikola. Nikola fetched a combined $100 million of funding evenly from Hanwha Ene

Market Sept. 21, 2020

Korean investment banking group Mirae Asset Group is being swamped by litigations at home and abroad, including one against China’s Dajia Insurance Group surrounding high-profile hotel deals in the United States, filings showed Monday. As of the end of June, the total litigation costs incurred to brokerage house Mirae Asset Daewoo and its affiliates could exceed 7 trillion won ($6 billion) if the group loses all 35 lawsuits in which it is involved. The cost has gone up from 68.8 billion

Market Sept. 21, 2020

The Seoul Metropolitan Government said Friday that it is scheduled to accept new applicants for a program that offers office space for foreign financial firms at affordable prices in Yeouido, a financial hub in the city. The municipal government plans to run the Seoul International Financial Office on the 16th floor of the One IFC building. Eligible applicants include foreign or South Korean financial institutions, and finance-related international organizations or nonprofit corporations enter

Market Sept. 18, 2020

The stock price of petrochemical-to-battery company LG Chem rebounded Friday after a sharp loss immediately after its announcement during trading hours Thursday that it would split off its battery operation. LG Chem shares climbed 3.3 percent in the Friday trading session. LG Chem is the fifth-largest stock on the main bourse, Kospi, with 47.1 trillion won ($40.6 billion) market cap. The slight recovery came after the Seoul-based company unveiled plans to carve out its battery unit under a ne

Market Sept. 18, 2020

South Korean asset manager Shinhan BNP Paribas Asset Management said Friday that it would beef up efforts to take climate change into account in its asset management business, as part of its green finance and impact investing. Under its climate action declaration released Friday, the joint venture of Shinhan Financial Group and BNP Paribas Asset Management will consider the impact its investment decisions and financial products could have on climate change. It is the first such declaration in

Market Sept. 18, 2020

Representatives of South Korean institutional investors said Tuesday they were increasingly tapping into distressed asset classes in their capital deployment to real estate assets, as the novel coronavirus disruption in the market is upping the appetite for the two extremes: very safe and very risky. The so-called “barbell strategy” is playing out to fight the downside impact of COVID-19, amid heightening pressure to deploy capital, institutional investors said during PERE Investor

Market Sept. 17, 2020

Users of Toss, a local financial services app operated by Viva Republica, spent 65 percent of their disaster relief funds in less than a month, the company said Thursday, referring to its data analysis. According to the estimate, 65 percent of the total 395.2 billion won ($336.5 million) in spending by 778,000 recipients was spent before end-May, after the Korean government started to dole out some 14 trillion won to every Korean household that month. Viva Republica compiled the data from use

Economy Sept. 17, 2020