Korea’s state-run utility firm Korea Electric Power Corp. and top cosmetics-maker AmorePacific saw their rankings of market capitalization shoot up among listed companies on the KOSPI this year, on the back of lowered costs on cheap oil and the global popularity of “K-Beauty” products, industry data showed Monday.

According to data by the Korea Exchange, KEPCO’s market cap gained 17.8 percent on-year to 37.81 trillion won ($32.27 billion) as of March 23, rising to No. 2 in the KOSPI ranking from 10th in 2013.


The explosive sales growth of Korean skin care products pushed AmorePacific’s market cap ranking to No. 8 with 22.3 trillion won as of March 23. The company was unseen among KOSPI’s top 10 players in 2013.

In contrast, the nation’s top steelmaker POSCO’s market cap, No. 4 in 2013 with 28.46 trillion won, plummeted and left the top 10 in May last year, seemingly hurt by oversupply amid competition against Chinese peers.

Top conglomerate Samsung Group’s subsidiaries performed strong on the KOSPI this year. Samsung Electronics, Samsung Life Insurance and Samsung C&T, which recently merged with Cheil Industries, all made it within the top 10 this year.

The total market cap of KOSPI inched up by 1.71 percent to 1,264 trillion won as of March 23 from last year, continuing growth for four consecutive years.

However, the proportion of top 10 market cap shares in the total market cap on KOSPI continued to fall to 33.38 percent this year from 38.35 percent in 2013.

By Kim Yoon-mi (yoonmi@heraldcorp.com)