[THE INVESTOR] South Korea’s credit card spending rose more than 22 percent from a year earlier in May, data from the Credit Finance Association showed on June 23.

Overall credit card purchases came to 63.2 trillion won (US$54.8 billion) last month, up 22.3 percent from the same month last year.

The on-year rise marks a significant acceleration from a 7.1 percent on-year gain posted in May 2015.



Such an increase was partly attributed to a surge in the amount of tax payments made with credit cards, which spiked over 340 percent on-year to some 9.5 trillion won in May.

Non-tax card spending also rose 8.4 percent on-year, compared with a 5.6 percent gain in the same month last year.

The increase in spending was also attributed to the designation of May 6 as a special holiday leading to a four-day weekend along with the May 5 Children’s Day.

The total number of credit card purchases jumped 10.9 percent on-year to 821 million, with the number of purchases made with debit cards also increasing 16.5 percent to 534 million.

The average amount of each purchase came to 46,579 won, up 8.2 percent from the same period last year.

Partly reflecting a rise in the number of people traveling over the special holiday, card spending at hotels and other lodgings gained 2.5 percent to 327.8 billion won, the data showed.

(theinvestor@heraldcorp.com)