South Koreans have directly invested over 16 trillion won in overseas tax havens over the past five years, a lawmaker said Sunday, citing government data.Rep. An Min-suk of the main opposition Democratic Party, releasing data obtained from the National Tax Service, the Korea Customs Service and other government agencies, said South Korean individuals and enterprises funneled 16.15 trillion won ($14.4 billion) in direct investment into a number of overseas tax havens, including the Cayman Islands

Shinhan Bank, a South Korean lender, said Sunday it has raised 30 billion yen ($299 million) by selling bonds denominated in the Japanese currency.Two-year, fixed-rate bonds worth 27 billion yen were priced to yield 0.83 percent or 50 basis points more than the yen-swap rate, while two-year floating rate notes worth 3 billion yen carry an interest of the three-month Yen Libor, or the three-month yen-based London Inter-bank Offered Rate, plus a 60 basis point spread, Shinhan Bank said. A basis po

South Korean stocks are expected to trade higher this week on abated concerns over a possible reduction in the United States’ quantitative easing moves, analysts said over the weekend.The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index closed at 1,871.41 points on Friday, down 0.2 percent from the previous week.Earlier last week, Seoul shares gathered ground after China’s National Bureau of Statistics said its gross domestic product growth rose 7.5 percent on-year in the April-June period. China is

Tensions already ran high at Honda Motor Co. in October 2011, two months after Consumer Reports ridiculed the onetime favorite Civic as a substandard car, when President Takanobu Ito saw drawings of the next Fit. He ripped up the plans and summoned his top two designers. “The design had no character and looked very much like its predecessor,” said Yoshinori Asahi, who co-designed Honda’s top-of-the line NSX supercar. “That made us worried about the future of the car.” Almost two years later, Tok

The South Korean government will spend a combined 10 trillion won ($8.9 billion) on the project to develop 20 new drugs over the next five years in collaboration with private local drug makers, the health ministry said Sunday.The government will also form a fund of 500 billion won to help the local pharmaceutical companies expand their presence in the global drug market by acquiring promising overseas drug makers during the same period, the ministry said.The new drug development project aims to

South Korean adults drank more than 330 cups of coffee per person annually in 2011, a report by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs said Sunday. In a report on the local consumption of processed foods, the ministry said annual domestic consumption of coffee products totaled about 1.26 trillion won (US$1.12 billion) as of 2011.The consumption volume indicates that adult South Koreans drank an average of 331 cups of coffee a year, said the ministry report compiled on the basis of a

The high popularity of South Korean pop culture has helped the country earn more money in its intellectual property rights (IPR) from abroad last year from a year ago, data showed Sunday.   According to data by the Bank of Korea, South Korean companies associated with Korean pop culture earned US$800 million in royalties from IPRs overseas in 2012, up 17.6 percent or $120 million from $680 million in the previous year.   The figure represented 23.3 percent of South Korea's overall IPR income fro

The popularity of foreign bottled water appears to be waning in South Korea, apparently affected by the protracted economic slump, industry data released on Sunday indicated.  According to local retailers, their sales of imported bottled water began to decline last year and have experienced a two-digit fall this year.   Market leader E-Mart said its sales of foreign bottled water sank 9.3 percent in the first half, with the monthly decrease rate standing at 4.8 percent in January, 9.1 percent in

The number of South Korea's overseas tourists topped 7 million in the first half for the first time, official data showed Sunday.The Korea Tourism Organization said a record 7.23 million South Korean residents traveled overseas in the January-June period, up 9.6 percent from 6.59 million a year earlier.The state-run organization explained that a growing leisure boom among locals has contributed to the rapid increase in overseas departures.Notably, the number of South Korean visitors to Japan jum

South Korea's finance minister expressed concern that the rollback of stimulus measures by advanced countries could have a negative ripple effect on theglobal economy, his office said Saturday.The concerns were raised by Finance Minister Hyun Oh-seok during talks with his Chinese counterpart Lou Jiwei that were held before the start of the group of 20 meeting here in Moscow, Russia. Hyun emphasized the need for global cooperation to effectively cope with the negative ripple effect and Lou shared