[Monitor] S. Korea to seal landmark currency swap deal with Switzerland

South Korea’s central bank, the Bank of Korea, announced Friday it would sign a currency swap deal on Feb. 20 with Switzerland‘s counterpart, the Swiss National Bank. The agreement will be signed in Zurich, Switzerland.The deal is expected to allow the Korean won and Swiss franc to be purchased and repurchased between the two central banks, as large as 10 billion Swiss franc ($10.6 billion). The maturity period will be three years and can be extended upon an additional bilateral agre

Feb. 11, 2018

[Photo News] Shinhan Bank offers bonus rate for ‘Sunfull’ clean internet participants

Shinhan Bank will offer a 0.5 percent bonus rate to clients participating in the “Sunfull” clean Internet campaign, the bank said in a ceremony held at its Seoul headquarters Tuesday.The Sunfull Internet Peace Movement involves leaving positive comments online to encourage support and consideration among online users, Shinhan Bank said in a statement.The campaign is jointly hosted by the Sunfull Foundation, which aims to spread peace through non offensive online comments and educate

Feb. 7, 2018

Celltrion to transfer to Kospi on Friday

Celltrion, a biosimilar maker listed on South Korea’s second-tier bourse Kosdaq, will begin trading on the top-tier market Kospi starting Friday, according to the Korea Exchange on Wednesday.Celltrion is the largest Kosdaq-listed share, with 31.4 trillion won ($28.9 billion) in market cap as of Wednesday. The maker of biosimilar drugs, such as Remsima and Truxima, is expected to constitute Korean markets’ composite benchmark indexes such as KRX 300 and Kospi 200. On Monday, the KRX,

Feb. 7, 2018

[Monitor] US holdings of Korean stocks at record, rate hike-induced exodus feared

US investors held 265.1 trillion won ($244 billion) worth of stocks listed in South Korea as of the end of 2017, accounting for nearly 42 percent of all foreign-owned stocks, data from the Financial Supervisory Service showed Wednesday.US investors net bought stocks worth over 13 trillion won last year, becoming a major force behind the local bourse’ strong rally. The volume of US investment has increased by fourfold from 2008, when the Fed began its zero-rate policy, pushing investors to

Feb. 7, 2018

Seoul to take actions, if needed, to calm market worries

Korea is prepared to take action to stem market instability recently caused by falling bond prices, which sent the local stock market plunging for the second straight session, the country's top economic policymaker said Wednesday. "We are closely monitoring market moves," Finance Minister Kim Dong-yeon told reporters after an economy-related ministers meeting. "We will take measures, if necessary."  Like other global markets, the Seoul stock market has been shaken by a s

Feb. 7, 2018

US stock funds feared to exit Korea in case of rate reversal

US investors in South Korean stocks may flee the local market should America's interest rates rise above Seoul's benchmark rate, analysts said Wednesday. The US Federal Reserve is tipped to jack up the federal funds rate three to four times this year on solid economic growth and rising inflationary pressure. The Federal Open Market Committee, the Fed's rate-setting body, is widely projected to raise interest rates at a March 20-21 meeting, which would lead to a reversal of key rates in the two c

Feb. 7, 2018

Authorities to expand recruitment probe to nonbank financial institutes

As part of an ongoing campaign to eradicate recruitment irregularities from the financial circle, the authorities are now seeking to expand their investigation into nonbank financial institutions. Concerns have been raised, however, that excessive control over private financial units may be taken as an infringement of business autonomy, which the incumbent government has often been blamed for.The Financial Supervisory Service is currently discussing with the Financial Services Commission on kick

Feb. 6, 2018

KOFIA hails halt of tax change for foreign investors

The Korea Financial Investment Association hailed Tuesday the decision by the Ministry of Finance and Strategy to suspend plans to impose capital gains tax on a wider range of foreign investors from nations that do not have a tax treaty with Korea.Kwon Yong-won, chairman of the self-regulatory organization for financial investment industry, called the decision “a cornerstone for building a stable condition for investors at home and abroad,” in a release Tuesday. “We welcome the

Feb. 6, 2018

Authorities to keep close tabs on widening volatility in US markets

South Korea‘s authorities said on Tuesday they would keep close tabs on the widening volatility in the markets in the United States that have cast a shadow on stock markets here. “We will closely watch on how the US market volatility would impact local markets,” the Bank of Korea Gov. Lee Ju-yeol told press Tuesday.Financial Supervisory Service Gov. Choe Heung-sik also asked high-ranking officials in a meeting to brace for negative impacts, saying the constant rise in stock pri

Feb. 6, 2018

About 8% of cryptocurrency accounts converted to real-name trading system

About 8 percent of virtual bank accounts for cryptocurrency trading have been converted to real-name bank accounts, a week after the government ended anonymous trading of cryptocurrencies, industry sources said Tuesday. The real-name trading system, which came into effect from Jan. 30, is part of the government's latest measures to curb speculative investment into virtual coins amid growing fears that a cryptocurrency bubble may be set to burst.There are about 1.74 million cryptocurrency account

Feb. 6, 2018

Foreign buying on KOSDAQ hits 9-year high in 2017

Foreign buying of shares traded on the secondary KOSDAQ market in 2017 reached the highest level since the global financial crisis, with their ownership hitting a fresh high, data showed Tuesday.Offshore investors bought a net 3.14 trillion won ($2.88 billion) worth of shares on the minor bourse last year, the largest since the 2008 worldwide financial debacle, according to the data from the Financial Supervisory Service.The previous record was set in 2013, when foreigners' net buying came to 1.

Feb. 6, 2018

Hawkish Fed, strong dollar jolt Korean markets

South Korea’s stock markets tumbled and sovereign bond yields rose sharply Monday in sync with other bearish financial markets in the United States and Asia, amid the US Federal Reserve’s signal for a March rate hike, the hawkish remarks of outgoing Fed chair Janet Yellen and the strengthening dollar. Analysts here said the impact on the market from the hawkish US Fed is inevitable, but at the same time played down possibilities of a lingering impact on the market. Korea’s top-

Feb. 5, 2018

Advertisement, telecom stocks to likely benefit most from Olympics

Advertising firm Cheil Worldwide's stocks were predicted to benefit the most from the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics thanks to its business projects for the games, a survey of securities firms showed Monday.Cheil Worldwide was picked as the expected beneficiary of the Olympics by six of the 10 securities firms that participated in the survey by Yonhap. The securities companies were asked to name three stocks that they saw as gaining the most from the sports event that opens Friday."Cheil

Feb. 5, 2018

Regulators, banks feud over recruitment probe

Tension is expected to escalate this week in the financial circles as the regulators tightened grip over the persisting recruitment scandals which allegedly involve some of the banking groups’ chiefs while the corresponding banks remained in denial, gesturing at taking the case to court if necessary.Adding further to the conflict is their discord over stock dividends. In the wake of improved operating profits last year, banks are seeking to increase shareholders’ dividends but regula

Feb. 4, 2018

[Kosdaq Star] ‘Smart’ momentum highlights Posco ICT

This is the 50th in a series of articles analyzing major companies traded on the tech-heavy Kosdaq market. -- Ed.Posco ICT, an affiliate of steelmaking giant Posco, is one of a few stocks that step outside the box of dominantly strong sectors such as biopharma on the second-tier Kosdaq bourse, showing a stellar performance on its “smart” business portfolio.Growing global demand for building “smart” cities -- those built on infrastructure powered by information and communi

Feb. 4, 2018

KEB Hana, KB Kookmin banks suspected of illicit hiring

South Korea's two major banks are suspected of creating lists to give undue hiring favors to the families and acquaintances of influential figures, sources said Sunday.The Financial Supervisory Service has recently filed complaints with the prosecution against five banks, including KEB Hana Bank and KB Kookmin Bank, over alleged irregularities in hiring new staff.  The complaints allegedly included the two banks' lists of candidates suspected of receiving preferential treatments in the hiri

Feb. 4, 2018

End to ‘Kimchi premium’? Bitcoin nosedives below W8m

Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency in the world in market cap, sank further in South Korea on Friday, amid government talks for tighter regulation on the unfettered market. It was trading below the world average in Korea at around 7.7 million won ($7,090) per coin at around 9:50 p.m., a decrease of nearly 25 percent in 24 hours, according to the a local cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb.Bitcoin plummeted a day after the police raided the operator of Bi

Feb. 2, 2018

[Newsmaker] Samsung's share price to rank far lower after stock split

The share price of top-cap Samsung Electronics Co. would rank much lower after its stock split is completed, data showed Friday.On the heels of record 2017 earnings driven by strong demand for chips, Samsung's board of directors Wednesday announced a dramatic 50:1 stock split aimed at enhancing shareholders' value and making the tech giant more accessible to investors.The decision -- if endorsed at the company's annual shareholders' meeting on March 23 -- would cut the face value of Samsung from

Feb. 2, 2018

Sovereign bonds take breather despite hawkish FOMC

South Korea’s state bonds took a breather Thursday despite a hawkish stance posed by the US Federal Open Market Committee during its decision to hold the key rate steady Wednesday.On Thursday, the three-year state bond yield slid 2.5 basis point to 2.25 percent, while the five-year sovereign bond yield sank 3.2 basis points to 2.54 percent compared to the Wednesday session’s close, according to an estimate by the Korea Financial Investment Association. The 20-year bond yield dipped 2

Feb. 1, 2018

Korea court orders seizure of bitcoins worth $2.3m earned from pornography

South Korea‘s appellate court ordered Tuesday the seizure of 191 bitcoins, worth 2.4 billion won ($2.3 million), as of 11:15 a.m. earned by providing online pornography content, overturning a district court‘s rule in September 2017 that implied seizing cryptocurrency was unlawful.This is the first time a Korean court has recognized virtual currencies encrypted on distributed ledgers as a means of profit, and therefore subject to confiscation. This carries with it an acknowledgement t

Jan. 30, 2018