Apparently spooked by problems facing the country's top-ranked companies in the shipping and shipbuilding industries, major commercial banks here are beginning to reduce the amount of their loans to large firms, market data showed Tuesday.

According to the data from the country's five commercial banks, their outstanding loans to large firms came to some 89.59 trillion won ($77.21 billion) as of end-May, down 1.83 trillion won from 91.42 trillion won at the end of 2015.

The five banks are KEB Hana Bank, Kookmin Bank, Woori Bank, Shinhan Bank and Nonghyup Bank. From a year earlier, the May reading also marked a 5.3 percent drop.

Such a drop comes amid a continued increase in overall corporate loans extended by all local lenders.

As of end-May, overall corporate loans came to 744.1 trillion won, marking a 3.7 trillion won on-month increase that also followed a 6.7 trillion won rise the previous month, the Bank of Korea said earlier.

Bank officials noted the drop in loans to large companies partly reflected a general cut in borrowing by large firms, but said it also indicated a growing tendency of local banks to be more cautious in extending loans to large companies that are said to have been hit especially hard by a slump in exports and sluggish local spending.

South Korea's exports have fallen every single month since the start of last year.

In an earlier poll conducted by the central bank, large companies said their sales shrank 2.9 percent on-year in the first three months of the year, while small and medium-sized firms said their sales expanded 2.1 percent on-year over the cited period.

In the first five months of the year, the same five commercial banks that have reduced their lending to large conglomerates have extended 10.2 trillion won in fresh loans to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), their data showed.

As of end-May, loans extended to SMEs by the five commercial banks came to 329.01 trillion won.

"It appears banks are reducing their loans to large companies as part of risk-management efforts, while boosting their lending to SMEs," a bank official said, asking not to be identified. (Yonhap)