Seoul shares open higher ahead of US election result

South Korean shares opened higher Wednesday, tracking overnight gains on Wall Street as investors awaited the results of the US presidential election. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) rose 20.98 points, or 0.9 percent, to 2,364.29 in the first 15 minutes of trading.   The local market followed gains on Wall Street as preelection polls favored Democratic nominee Joe Biden over President Donald Trump, raising investor hopes for reduced uncertainties surrounding

MarketNov. 4, 2020

SK hynix Q3 net more than doubles on Huawei effect, mobile demand recovery

SK hynix Inc., South Korea's second-largest chipmaker, on Wednesday reported estimate-beating third-quarter earnings on the back of a recovery in demand for mobile chips amid the pandemic. Its net profit stood at 1.07 trillion won ($950.4 million) in the third quarter of the year, up 117.5 percent from a year earlier, the company said in a regulatory filing. Operating profit for the July-September period more than doubled to 1.29 trillion won compared with 472.6 billion won a year ago, while

IndustryNov. 4, 2020

S. Korea's FX reserves up for 7th straight month to fresh record high in Oct.

South Korea's foreign reserves climbed for the seventh straight month in October due to a rise in the value of non-dollar assets and an increase in investment returns, central bank data showed Wednesday. The country's foreign reserves came to a record high of $426.5 billion as of end-October, up $5.96 billion from a month earlier, according to the Bank of Korea (BOK). Foreign reserves consist of securities and deposits denominated in overseas currencies, International Monetary Fund reserve pos

EconomyNov. 4, 2020

Korean office workers warm to stock investment: survey

The proportion of South Korean office workers taking a keen interest in stock investment has surged in recent months as retail investors began a buying boom, betting on gains from market volatility, a survey showed Tuesday. According to job portals Job Korea and Albamon, half of the 593 wage-earning respondents said they invested in stocks. The figure was 22.8 percentage points higher than two years ago, when the same survey was conducted.　 The survey also showed that 76.7 percent were investi

MarketNov. 3, 2020

Chung meets union, urges cooperation in crisis

Hyundai Motor Group Chairman Chung Euisun met with the labor union for the first time since taking office. With both labor and management under new leadership, the automaker, which has long struggled with its militant union, now sees hope of stabilizing the relationship for the first time in 11 years. 　 Chung had a lunch meeting on Friday with Lee Sang-soo, head of the labor union, after President Moon Jae-in’s visits to Hyundai’s Ulsan production plants the same day, according to

MobilityNov. 3, 2020

Finance Minister offers to resign over major-shareholder taxation furor

South Korea’s Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Hong Nam-ki offered his resignation on Tuesday, in an apparent response to the market backlash against the government’s proposed changes to the taxation rules. “I have offered my resignation and submitted my letter today, taking responsibility over the prolonged disputes,” the fiscal chief said during a parliamentary finance committee meeting. His abrupt announcement came while answering a question from Rep. Ch

EconomyNov. 3, 2020

Mobile carriers call for spectrum auction amid redistribution dispute

South Korea's three major telecom operators on Tuesday called on the government to hold an auction to redistribute their network spectrum set to expire next year amid controversy over prices. Spectrum for 2G, 3G and 4G LTE networks held by the three -- SK Telecom Co., KT Corp. and LG Uplus Corp. -- are up for redistribution by the government next year. In return, the government wants a price for the redistribution as high as 5.5 trillion won ($4.8 billion), a parliamentary audit showed last m

TechnologyNov. 3, 2020

KAIST develops deepfake detection tool

Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology has developed an artificial intelligence-powered tool designed to detect computer-manipulated images, the institution said Tuesday. The new Kaicatch software, developed by the KAIST research team led by professor Lee Heung-kyu, is the nation’s first deepfake detection tool, the institution said. The software is capable of analyzing both images and videos to find artificial changes that might be invisible to the human eye. The team deve

TechnologyNov. 3, 2020

S-Oil deploys 2nd offshore crude oil offloading facility worth W172b in Ulsan

S-Oil has installed its second single point mooring unit in Ulsan, a loading buoy anchored offshore that allows tankers to offload their crude oil via pipeline to the refineries, the company said Tuesday. According to the South Korean refinery, the SPM unit, the second one at the company’s Ulsan plant, began its operation Tuesday. Installed in the waters off Ulsan New Port, the SPM unit is equipped with mooring equipment that can hold fast tankers and is connected with 44-inch diamet

IndustryNov. 3, 2020

SKC posts highest quarterly operating profit since 2015

SKC on Tuesday announced an earnings surprise for the third quarter of this year, recording a revenue of 723.7 billion won ($637.1 million) and an operating profit of 55.3 billion won, the largest-ever operating profit since 2015. According to the chemical and tech material producing unit under South Korean conglomerate SK Group, it saw a 19.7 percent and a 44 percent jump in revenue and operating profit on-year, respectively, thanks to its business model centered on mobility and semiconducto

IndustryNov. 3, 2020

[News Focus] On economy, pessimists outnumber optimists for 29 consecutive months

SEJONG -- It has been found that nearly half of South Koreans were still pessimistic about economic conditions, far outnumbering optimists, a survey showed. According to a poll conducted on Oct. 27-29 by Gallup Korea, 46 percent of the 1,000 respondents said that economic conditions would deteriorate in the coming year. Only 23 percent were upbeat about the economy. Another 27 percent said the economic conditions ahead would remain roughly the same. Further, pessimists outnumbered optimists f

EconomyNov. 3, 2020

Samsung announces human-centered AI vision at forum

Samsung Electronics announced human-centered artificial intelligence as the direction of its research and development on AI and introduced ongoing projects at its annual AI forum on Tuesday. Sebastian Seung, president and head of Samsung Research, said, “Today’s theme, human-centered AI, is in line with Samsung’s vision to make products and services that further enrich people’s life.” The research chief introduced the institution’s projects in the fields o

TechnologyNov. 3, 2020

Seoul stocks rally amid US presidential election uncertainty

South Korean stocks rallied Tuesday on hopes the shares will advance after an apparently imminent US presidential election result. The local currency closed at 1,134.1 won against the US dollar, down 0.5 won from the previous session’s close. The nation’s benchmark Kospi closed at 2,343.31, up 43.15 points, or 1.88 percent, from the previous session. The index prolonged its uptrend since marking 2,315.81 earlier in the day. Foreign and institutional investors scooped up 208.1 bill

MarketNov. 3, 2020

Pricey Gangnam apartments stand out as homeowners' safe haven

Apartment units in southern Seoul's Gangnam-gu stood out among housing options in South Korea’s capital city in October in terms of their valuation, as they are increasingly regarded as a safe haven in times of uncertainty in housing market regulation. The estimate comes as multiple-home owners are struggling to keep multiple flats in their portfolio due to tougher housing regulations to stamp out the speculative buying. The price gap between Gangnam-gu and adjacent districts in southeas

EconomyNov. 3, 2020

Doosan's nonprofit foundation to sell stake in fuel cell unit

Doosan Group's scholarship foundation signed a deal Tuesday to sell its 3.16 percent stake in Doosan Fuel Cell Co., the fuel cell maker said. The foundation will sell 2.27 million preferred shares in Doosan Fuel Cell after the market closes via a block deal, Doosan Fuel Cell said in a regulatory filing. The stake sale to be made Thursday will lower the interest in Doosan Fuel Cell held by the group's holding company, Doosan Corp., and major shareholders to 50.31 percent from 53.47 percent.

EconomyNov. 3, 2020

Retail industry sees young golfers boost sales

Lee Eun-ji, 28, recently started to take golf lessons. For long, she had thought golf was sports for people her parents’ age, but this year, it came to her as a nice outdoor activity to enjoy, in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. “Frankly, I thought golf would be boring because it looked like a quiet sport. But with COVID-19 keeping me at home, I looked for different outdoor activities and landed at golf,” Lee, an office worker in Seoul told The Korea Herald. Similar to L

ConsumerNov. 3, 2020

Contactless payments surge 17% amid pandemic: BOK

Non-face-to-face payments have surged 17 percent on-year since the outbreak of COVID-19, a report released by the central bank on Tuesday showed. Contactless payments made via electronic devices and other noncash methods inched up by 1.4 percent on-year in the first nine months of this year, the Bank of Korea said in a report.　 “Contactless payment transactions have expanded as usage of mobile payments have increased compared with actual credit or debit card payments,” the report

EconomyNov. 3, 2020

LS Cable & System ‘hack-proof’ optical cable

South Korean cable maker LS Cable & Systems said on Tuesday that it is ready to begin the mass production of a new optical cable which can “block out hacking.” Using special fiber optics with enhanced coatings, the company explained the new cable is designed to prevent illegal leaks and disturbance. When an optical cable is bent in the shape of a circle, some of the light traveling along it escapes. Hackers then can steal information by connecting hacking devices and intercepti

TechnologyNov. 3, 2020

Sugentech to export coronavirus, flu kits to Europe, US

South Korean biopharmaceutical firm Sugentech Inc. said Tuesday it has signed an agreement to export three different types of diagnostic kits for the novel coronavirus and seasonal influenza to the United States and Europe. Under the agreement with Germany-based DiaSys Diagnostic Systems, a total of 200,000 rapid antigen kits by Sugentech to detect the COVID-19 virus will be distributed in Germany. The value of the deal was not revealed. Sugentech's test kit that can detect both the COVID-19 v

IndustryNov. 3, 2020

S. Koreans' time on YouTube up 20% in Sept.: data

South Koreans are estimated to have spent over 50 billion minutes on YouTube in September amid the pandemic, a 20 percent jump from a year earlier, data showed Tuesday. Mobile app tracker Wiseapp said the video streaming application was the application most used by the country's 33.7 million Android smartphone users in September at 53.1 billion minutes, compared with 44.3 billion minutes spent on the app the previous year. Wiseapp said the pandemic likely led to increased use of mobile applica

TechnologyNov. 3, 2020