Downsizing is sweeping the securities industry with firms tightening management and costs amid the slowdown in the manufacturing sector, the Korea Financial Investment Association and analysts said.Some 60 brokerage houses have reduced the number of their retail branches by almost 100 nationwide to 1,681 over the last year, with some 720 executives being let go. Mirae Asset Securities closed down the most retail branches at 39, followed by Tongyang Securities shutting down 20 of its offices. Han

More and more Koreans are getting married, but they still seem reluctant to have children due to rising living costs and education expenses.Korea ranks third with a marriage rate of 7.13 per 1,000 people among the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development members in 2009, according to its data.Korea follows Turkey, which has a marriage rate of 9.04, and the U.S., which has a rate of 7.31.Meanwhile, Korea continues to rank the lowest in fertility rate at 1.23 per woman in 2010, follow

Hankook Tire, Korea’s biggest tire maker, posted record global sales in 2012, thanks to brisk sales of its premium tires to luxury automobile manufacturers worldwide.Revenue of Hankook Tire reached over 7 trillion won in 2012, up 8.3 percent from 6.4 trillion won a year earlier, according to consolidated financial statements.Its operating profit reached some 913 billion won, up 57.9 percent from 578 billion won in the same period.The company attributes its record-breaking revenue to increased su

Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power, a state-run nuclear power plant operator, said on Friday that it submitted its bid for a nuclear power project launched by TeollisuudenVoima, a Finland-based utility company.This marks the first time for a Korean power company to seek a nuclear power deal in Europe that has been traditionally dominated by advanced European players. Korea Hydro will be competing to build TVO’s Olkiluoto-4 plant with KEPCO Engineering & Construction, Doosan Heavy Industries & Construct

The successful launch on Wednesday of the Korea Space Launch Vehicle-1, or the Naro, has brought South Korea, as Education, Science and Technology Minister Lee Joo-ho put it, a “step forward” in advancing its space technology.This was Korea’s latest and third launch of a rocket carrying a science satellite into space.Experts, however, said the mission to see large economic returns in space development was only half-complete, given that the Naro was a “joint-venture” rocket with key engine techno

Japan’s weak yen policy may be good news for Japanese companies seeking export breakthroughs, but it is gradually becoming a nightmare for Korean companies directly competing with their Japanese peers overseas.Automobiles and tech consumer products are two sectors in which Koreans will face tough competition with Japan, and a weak yen is forcing Korean exporters to revise down their sales and profit forecasts this year.More than 80 of the 113 listed companies have revised down their target for o

When Japan set its inflation target and declared a change in its monetary regime for a weak yen, global investors and economists took this as a sign that currency wars would soon be launched to aid the economy, especially the export sector.Japan’s weak yen policy, aimed at pulling its economy out of deflation and recession, became one of the hottest topics at the recently concluded World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.Japan’s Finance Minister Taro Aso told reporters that its central bank w

Korea’s four major financial holding companies are about to post their worst annual earnings for 2012, with their stock prices likely to take a hit going forward.Four holding companies ― Shinhan, KB, Woori and Hana ― are expected to post a combined net profit of 7.87 trillion won in 2012, down almost 1 trillion won, from a year earlier, according to FNGuide, an online securities information provider.This fall could reach 2 trillion won in total should Hana Financial leave out negative goodwill w

The Bank of Korea said Sunday that it has allowed 12 local commercial banks, beginning with Korea Exchange Bank, to extend renminbi-denominated loans to Korean traders for the first time.This comes as Korea’s central bank and the People’s Bank of China agreed to let their companies settle trade bills with their respective currencies using part of the two sides’ currency swap deal worth 64 trillion won or 360 billion yuan.Korean importers would be able to borrow from their local lenders that will

The International Monetary Fund forecast a global growth rate of 3.5 percent this year, down from its initial 3.6 percent estimate in October.The IMF said the slow recovery in the eurozone and uncertainties concerning the U.S. fiscal cliff pose downside risks to the world’s economic growth.The U.S. is expected to post 2 percent growth, and Japan will grow 1.2 percent due to its stimulus programs.China would maintain growth above 8 percent, but the eurozone would shrink 0.2 percent, it said.South

The Korean won is being pushed to the edge by two major international currencies of the U.S. dollar and the Japanese yen, raising concerns over Korean exports, the country’s main growth engine.With Japan joining the U.S. in monetary easing to stimulate its economy, there is a high chance that the Korean won will further strengthen against their currencies, causing its top-selling automobiles and tech gadgets to lose their price competitiveness overseas.Finance Minister Bahk Jae-wan has stepped i

Foreign investments in bonds increased in 2012, spurred by monetary easing overseas that led to an inflow of capital seeking higher-yielding assets.According to the Bank of Korea, foreign net shareholdings in Korean treasuries and monetary stabilization bonds reached a record high of 91 trillion won ($86 billion) as of the end of December 2012, accounting for 7 percent of the total.Funds from the U.S., Hong Kong and Singapore were the biggest investors of Korean fixed-income securities, with the

Korea’s lottery ticket sales hit an all-time high last year, exceeding the regulatory limit imposed by the country’s gambling watchdog for two consecutive years.Sales reached some 3.2 trillion won ($3 billion) in 2012, up about 3.4 percent from 3.08 trillion won a year earlier, according to the Lottery Commission, which is under the wing of the Ministry of Strategy and Finance, on Monday.An increase in consumer purchases of tickets for online lotteries, pension lotteries and traditional electron

The Bank of Korea is expected to brief the transition team of President-elect Park Geun-hye on overall monetary policy and economic outlook on Friday.BOK officials said that the subjects presented would range from overviews of its monetary policy to household debt and its economic forecast for 2013. Although the team’s official policy briefing ended on Thursday with the statistics bureau, the team included the central bank at the last minute after it had omitted it from the seven-day briefing sc

The National Pension Service, the country’s pension fund manager, has been increasingly called upon to carry out duties for the markets, becoming more than a mere manager of public money investing in safe assets.Whether it is stabilizing the stock market as it did at the height of the global financial crisis in 2008 or providing support to Korean companies for cross-border mergers and acquisitions, the NPS will likely once again emerge into the spotlight as a savior of sorts ― this time, for the

Korea Customs Service is to follow the example of the National Tax Service and crack down on wealthy individuals and corporations that illicitly channel money out of the country to dodge tax payments.In a report to the transition team of President-elect Park Geun-hye, the KCS said that it would also toughen its inspections on corporations that have set up paper companies in offshore havens to avoid taxes.This is in line with efforts by the president-elect to secure a budget to finance welfare ex

The transition team of President-elect Park Geun-hye is considering expanding the rights for government agencies to file complaints with prosecutors against malpractices by conglomerates.The Fair Trade Commission, the country’s antitrust watchdog, has had the exclusive right to do so against corporate violators.But the team is also seeking to disperse this power to the Small and Medium Business Administration, the Board of Audit and Inspection, the Public Procurement Service and the Anti-Corrupt

The lowest-paid Korean could afford to buy fewer than one and a half hamburgers after working for an hour in 2012.The price of a Mac Donald’s Big Mac stood at $3.21, leaving Koreans’ purchasing power below that of almost two dozen countries on the list, said Albain, an online part-time job portal, using the Big Mac Index data.Meanwhile, Koreans received a minimum wage of $4.32 an hour, it explained.Korea’s Big Mac buying power ranked 23rd among 44 countries evaluated in the index, with one of lo

DETROIT (AP) ― Ford says it plans to hire 2,200 engineers, computer programmers and other white-collar workers this year as U.S. demand for new vehicles picks up. That’s in addition to the 8,100 salaried and hourly jobs Ford added in the U.S. last year as it increased production and introduced new cars. U.S. car and truck sales rose 13 percent to 14.5 million in 2012, the highest level in five years.Ford will use social media to find tech-savvy candidates. It’s also stepping up recruitment of mi

Economic-related ministries and agencies are preparing for their policy briefings to President-elect Park Geun-hye, starting with the Small and Medium Business Administration on Friday.Next in line will be the National Tax Service, which is expected to brief and make suggestions on taming and regulating the underground economy, or the black market.It has been conventional for the Ministry of Strategy of Finance to brief the team before the NTS.Political analysts observed that the tax agency has