Korea’s economic dependency on top conglomerates has continued to rise, posing a challenge to the incumbent President Park Geun-hye administration seeking to restructure the country’s economic landscape.

A report by Korea’s Fair Trade Commission showed that sales generated by the top four private conglomerates, or chaebol, accounted for more than 53 percent of the total in the first quarter of this year, up from 52 percent a year ago.

The top four industrial groups sanctioned by the antitrust watchdog against further expanding through a web of equity cross-shareholdings are Samsung, Hyundai Motor, SK and LG.

State-run conglomerates such as Korea Electric Power Corp. and Korea Land & Housing Corp. have been included in the FTC list of giant companies restricted from additional equity tie-ups.

The FTC listed 62 conglomerates this year, down from 63 in 2012. This marks the first drop in the number of large groups restricted from expansion in four years.

The number of conglomerates’ subsidiaries dropped to 1,680 in the first quarter of 2013, from 1,740 a year earlier, for the first time since 2009 when the antitrust agency started to beef up its monitoring of big businesses.

However, their dominance over the economy still persists as empirical data showed their sales increased almost 7 percent to 24.8 trillion won in the same period.

The decrease in the number of conglomerates’ subsidiaries is in part due to groups restructuring their key units or liquidating their non-core assets.

The top four’s net profit accounted for about 80 percent, up from 61 percent in the same period, with Samsung’s assets reaching over 300 trillion won for the first time due to brisk profit.

The market capitalization of the top 10 conglomerates accounted for more than 60 percent of the total.

Big businesses were able to increase their size through cross-shareholdings especially during the previous administration which implemented chaebol-friendly policies by softening rules against them, according to the Citizens’ Coalition for Economic Justice.

By Park Hyong-ki (hkp@heraldcorp.com)