The combined net profit of South Korea’s major brokerages for the first half of the year inched up 5.7 percent on-year, data released by the Financial Supervisory Service showed Tuesday, marking a new record high.
According to the financial watchdog, the combined net profit of 56 brokerages for the January-June period came to 2.8 trillion won ($2.35 billion), slightly up from the corresponding figure of 2.7 trillion won from the same period last year, which was also then a record high.
Their robust performances were buoyed by earnings in investment banking services. Commission fees from investment banking accounted for 36.1 percent of the total second-quarter commissions, up 2.1 percentage points from the first-quarter and 28.2 percent on-year.
Seoul`s financial district of Yeouido (Yonhap)
On a quarterly basis, however, the firms saw their combined net profit shed 5.6 percent in the second quarter from three months earlier, to 1.28 trillion won.
The combined assets of the firms stood at 490.6 trillion won as of June, up 3.9 percent from three months earlier, while their debts increased 4.1 percent to 432.2 trillion won in the same period.
On the latest data, a FSS official said that interest rate cuts led to an improvement in profit from bond issuances, but as the ongoing US-China trade war remains a risk factor weighing on the market, the government will closely monitor the situation.
By Jung Min-kyung (mkjung@heraldcorp.com)
