South Korea’s first vice finance minister said Friday the global food insecurity worsened by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic will not have a serious impact on the local food supply chain, but the government will continue to keep an eye on the market condition. “According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the FAO Food Price Index has continued its upward trend in recent months, signaling food insecurity around the globe,” Kim Yong-beom, first vice

NH Financial Group Chairman Kim Kwang-soo has officially been tapped to lead the Korea Federation of Banks, a representative body of commercial banks, officials said Friday.  The KFB board of directors unanimously approved Kim’s nomination as its 14th chairman during a general meeting held early in the morning. The appointment came after Kim was picked as the sole candidate to be KFB chief Tuesday, among seven candidates initially recommended for the post. Kim’s three-year te

CU provided details Thursday on plans to allow foreign currency exchange at its convenience stores early next year. BGF Retail, the operator of the convenience store brand, has signed a partnership with a local fintech startup U Fintech Hub, which provides a small overseas remittance service, in a step to launch foreign currency exchange service at its local branches, they said. Under the deal, the retail giant will receive technical support from the fintech firm to develop the service platf

Woori Financial Group said Wednesday that it has set up a 200 billion won ($180 million) fund to invest in social infrastructure projects, called the “Woori Global Infra New Deal Fund.”  In September the government announced its New Deal Fund, a state-led fund worth 20 trillion won aimed at investing in tech and green sectors, including artificial intelligence, renewable energy and hydrogen vehicles, through money pooled from government agencies, private financial institutions

NH Financial Group Chairman Kim Kwang-soo is likely to offer resignation soon as he was named the sole candidate to represent the nation’s largest bankers’ club, according to reports quoting insiders said Tuesday. On Monday, board members of the Korea Federation of Bank unanimously nominated Kim, among six other candidates. The federation is set to hold a general meeting on Friday to put Kim’s nomination to vote. If elected, Kim will officially start his term on Dec. 1, rep

Robo-adviser startups in South Korea saw their funds increase by more than 1 trillion won ($896.7 million) in a year, driven by stock trading fever amid the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic, industry data showed Sunday.  According to data from the Korea Financial Investment Association, the amount of funds entrusted to the country’s four major robo-adviser firms -- Fount, Aim, December & Company and Doomoolmori -- stood at 1.29 trillion won in the third quarter, up some 1.03 trillio

South Korea’s sovereign wealth fund Korea Investment Corp. said Sunday that it was now a member of the One Planet Sovereign Wealth Fund, the world’s largest multilateral working group convened by sovereign wealth funds across the globe to promote cooperation on climate change.  Established Dec. 12, 2017, at the “One Planet Summit” -- a global coalition launched by the French government and the UN to work together on climate change -- the fund exists to develop a f

South Korea’s top financial regulator said Thursday it has decided to relax regulations on five promising services proposed by local companies in continued efforts to spur innovation in the finance sector.  The move is part of the government‘s “regulatory sandbox” policy, which took effect in April last year. Under the regulatory program, the financial authorities suspend legal and regulatory requirements imposed on local financial companies, including both traditio

  Starting next year, financial consumers will be able to manage their banking histories, shopping patterns at beauty stores as well as cellphone data usage via a single digital platform. Shinhan Bank said Wednesday it has signed a memorandum of understanding with CJ Olive Networks, an online retail arm of CJ Group and Korean mobile carrier LG U+ in order to jointly set up a digital platform for MyData services, the bank said.  MyData is a government-led business model that collect

The Korean Federation of Community Credit Cooperatives, the nation’s leading financial cooperative, has been strengthening global cooperation with its foreign counterparts in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, the federation said Tuesday. 　 Under KFCC President Park Cha-hoon’s initiative, the financial cooperative has been exchanging messages with cooperatives around the world via Facebook and Twitter to encourage each other to stay strong during the pandemic. A total of 21 foreign

South Korea’s government and the ruling Democratic Party of Korea have decided to lower the maximum legal lending rate to 20 percent from the current 24 percent starting next year to ease financial burdens on beleaguered debtors, the nation’s top financial regulator said Monday. Through the rate cut, nearly 87 percent or 2.08 million of 2.39 million borrowers across the country -- being charged with 20 percent interest rate per annum or more -- are expected to see their debt shrin

Hanwha Life Insurance‘s third-quarter operating income surged by 134.6 percent on-year to 206.9 billion won ($185.5 million), mainly due to a lower loss ratio, the company said Friday. An increase in sales of Hanwha Life‘s guaranteed products has reduced its ratio of insurance claims to premiums, officials said.  The company’s third-quarter earnings was also driven by a decline in the insurer’s reserves set up to cover claims of variable life insurance products,

South Korea‘s vice finance minister said Friday the government will stabilize the cost to make kimchi by expanding supplies of major vegetables and ingredients.  “We are planning to extend the supply of vegetables in the market by employing either the government’s hoarded stocks for gimjang or those already purchased by local companies from agricultural farms under contract,” Kim Yong-beom, first vice minister of finance, said in a meeting with related officials to

Stocks of Asiana Airlines’s key affiliates sharply rose Friday following news report saying Korea’s Hanjin Group, parent of the nation’s largest airline Korean Air Lines Co Ltd, is in talks with the state-run Korea Development Bank to acquire the cash-strapped airline.  Shares of Asiana Airlines, the country’s No. 2 carrier, rose by 19.1 percent to 4,745 won ($4.25) in the early morning trading session, while its low-cost carrier unit Air Busan jumped 16.1 percent t

     Hur Yin, KB Kookmin Bank’ incumbent CEO, was officially tapped by board members to lead the lender for another year, the bank said Thursday. Earlier in October, KB Financial Group’s committee for CEO nominations had selected Hur as the sole candidate for the bank’s next leader. Hur is the first KB Kookmin chief to serve three consecutive terms. His third term will begin on Nov. 21. Since joining KB Kookmin Bank in 1998, the 59-year-old CEO has held key po

Hana Bank is set to allow employees to wear business-casual attire to create a relaxed working environment, industry sources said.  The lender has recently decided to adopt a more casual dress code as more than 80 percent of its employees surveyed were in favor of the plan. It has not decided yet when to implement the new dress code. The dress code transition is part of the financial company’s move to prove itself as an innovative bank. “To achieve innovation, the bank must c

Less than 1 percent of all banking transactions across the country were made in person, data showed Tuesday, suggesting an apparent change in the retail banking landscape favoring non-face-to-face services. In the first half of this year, the proportion of banking transactions carried out in person at bank branches accounted for 0.75 percent of the total. This was sharply down from 1.08 percent in 2019, continuing a downtrend that began in 2015, when the figure was 2.12 percent, said Rep. Yoon

  South Korea has fared well among the world’s major economies, with a related economic indicator showing a mid-level performance, the Korea Center for International Finance said Monday.  According to the Tracking Indices for the Global Economic Recovery, an index designed to measure global economic recovery by the think tank Brookings Institution and Financial Times, Asia’s fourth-largest economy posted minus 0.76. The figure marked 9th place among 23 leading economies,

The number of people residing alone hit more than 6 million as of this year as the prolonged coronavirus pandemic accelerated a stay-at-home trend while shifting interests towards stock investment from savings, an industry report showed Sunday. According to KB Financial Group’s report on single-person households in South Korea, the tally for one-person households reached 6.17 million, which accounts for 30.3 percent of all households. Relative to the entire population, the figure indica

    Park Sung-hyun, the incumbent chief strategy and sustainability officer of Shinhan Financial Group has been appointed as a new member to the prestigious Global Steering Committee under the United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative, the banking group said Sunday.  Launched in 1992, UNEP FI is a strategic public-private association set up by the UNEP and the global financial sector with the purpose of sustainable management. It is working with more than 300