South Korea’s financial watchdog said Monday it will look into whether local mutual cooperative funds followed rules on home loan extension as household debt has been on the rise, led by non-bank institutions.The Financial Supervisory Service said it plans to launch a field inspection into branches of the National Agricultural Cooperative Federation, or Nonghyup, and National Credit Union Federation of Korea in a bid to uncover irregularities related to the extension of household lending.The FSS

The country’s private pension market is on course to expand by about 34 percent this year as more are joining the retirement market in one of the world’s fastest-aging societies, industry sources said Monday.The retirement and personal pension market is forecast to exceed 250 trillion won ($218 billion) by the end of this year, up from 187 trillion won last year, sources said. The flock to the pension market comes as Korea is fast becoming an aged society, as senior citizens aged 65 or older are

Less than half of South Korean exporters predicted their overseas shipments will expand in 2012 amid lingering concerns of global economic slowdown, a survey showed Monday.According to a survey conducted by the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industries, 44.2 percent of 502 exporting companies said next year’s business will exceed figures for this year.The poll also showed 43.8 percent expected exports to remain unchanged from this year, while 12 percent expected a decrease in sales in foreign mar

Worsening external conditions, faltering domestic consumption cloud the outlook furtherWhen an illness spreads too far, few kinds of medicine can bring it back under control.The implication of the newly unveiled economic policy blueprints fits this scenario, unfortunately, as the impact is seen as severely limited, if not altogether ineffective. The Finance Ministry’s set of plans, announced on Monday, are aimed at fighting the stubbornly strong downward pressure on Asia’s fourth-largest economy

Samsung Electronics Co., the world’s largest maker of flat-screen TVs and liquid crystal display panels, said Monday that it has maintained its status as the top monitor supplier with a 15.5 percent market share in the third quarter, thanks to strong demand for upper-end products.Citing data released by International Data Corporation, Samsung said its sales of monitors rose more than 10 percent from a year earlier in the July-September period to 6.42 million units.The increase helped the Korean

LG Chem said Monday that it filed a lawsuit against SK Innovation on Friday, claiming it copied LG’s key proprietary battery separator technology for electric cars.The company said it took legal action after finding out that SK is in the stage of testing its battery for electric vehicles, which uses LG Chem’s technology, called the Safety Reinforced Separator.“We have filed the lawsuit not only because we want to be reimbursed for damages, but also to protect our own technology,” said an LG Chem

GDP outlook for 2012 lowered to 3.7%, inflation likely ease to 3.2%The government slashed its growth forecast for this year and next, backing off from its ambitious growth plan due to weakening consumption and persistent risk stemming from slumps in major economies, the Finance Ministry said Monday.

Persistent economic uncertainties in Europe may be putting a brake on Korean consumer spending as car and department store sales tumble, data showed Sunday.Combined revenues of three major department stores slipped 1.1 percent last month from a year ago, the first drop since February 2009, according to the Finance Ministry. Their year-on-year sales growth slowed from 8.3 percent in August to 6.5 percent in September, then to 3.1 percent in October. Sales of discount stores remained flat last mon

Asiana Airlines, Korea’s second-largest air carrier, marked an annual record for the second consecutive year with more than 10 million international passengers, the company announced Sunday. Asiana expects the number to reach 10.64 million by the end of December, a 2.3 percent increase from the last year’s record.Passenger traffic has been showing a fast recovery after the global financial crisis in 2008-2009. After two years of passenger number decreases, the number of passengers rose 21.5 perc

South Korean public corporations’ bond sales have nearly doubled in three years as they increasingly resort to debt issuance to help finance state development projects, financial sources said Sunday.The value of outstanding bonds issued by state land developer LH Corp. and other public corporations under the central and provincial governments came to 283 trillion won ($247 billion) as of Friday, according to the sources.The figure is up 89 percent from 150 trillion won at the end of 2008 and amo