The stricter qualifications required to secure a mortgage have sparked debate over the South Korean government’s move to address the country’s runaway household debt issue, with critics claiming the measure would only hurt the working-class people. According to the state-run Korea Housing Finance Corporation (HF) on Tuesday, qualifications for its flagship mortgage programs called “Bogeumjari Loan” will be tightened for the rest of the year, starting Wednesday, and it is considering similar meas

The South Korean government is moving to restrict real estate transactions in some areas despite an apparent slump in the overall property market that many say still is the only economic sector keeping the local economy moving forward.The move comes amid what government officials have called clear signs of speculation driving up prices to "abnormal levels" in certain areas."We are witnessing signs of abnormal superheating, such as skyrocketing home prices and unusually high numbers of bids for n

It is time for investors to further reduce their return expectations for the coming years, as the trend of low growth and low inflation is forecast to last longer than expected, said an expert on bond investment.William Adams, the chief investment officer in charge of a $75 billion fixed income team at MFS Investment Management based in Massachusetts, the US, sat with The Korea Herald on Friday to talk about the economic conditions that would affect their investment yields next year. William Ada

This is the 26th in a series of articles analyzing major companies by market capitalization traded on the tech-heavy Kosdaq market. -- Ed

South Koreans with savings-type pension schemes received a monthly average of only 280,000 won ($245) in pension last year, far less than the minimum cash needed for a post-work life, government data showed Monday.They paid a total of 16 trillion won for savings-type pension programs here in 2015 alone, with monthly payments amounting to 2.42 million won on average, according to the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS). They received a total of 1.36 trillion won in pension last year. An elderly m

Foreign currency deposits held by banks in South Korea dropped from a month earlier in September due mainly to a decline in US dollar deposits by exporters, central bank data showed Monday.Outstanding foreign currency deposits held by local residents came to $66.5 billion as of end-September, down $840 million from the previous month, according to the data from the Bank of Korea.Foreign deposits include those held by foreigners who have stayed in South Korea for more than six months, as well as

South Korea's pension funds have loaded up on shares of Samsung Electronics Co. amid the tech behemoth's stock rout in the wake of its smartphone fiasco, industry sources said Monday.Samsung, the top cap and darling of the South Korean stock market, decided last week to suspend production of the Galaxy Note 7 and pull the flagship smartphone out of the market after failing to resolve the battery-fire problem, sending its shares into a freefall.According to the sources, pension funds, one of the

The market cap of South Korea's top 10 business groups listed on the main bourse has risen 5.4 percent from the end of last year, data showed Monday.The 10 conglomerates' market cap reached 714.3 trillion won ($628 billion) as of last Wednesday, up 36.4 trillion won, according to data compiled by Korea Exchange, South Korea's stock market operator.By business group, Hyundai Heavy Industries Group took the first spot with its market cap standing at 13.1 trillion won last week, up 57.3 percent fro

South Korea's state financial watchdog said Monday it has launched a mobile service to offer information on the nation's financial transaction system.The Financial Supervisory Service opened the Financial Information Network, http://fine.fss.or.kr, in early September. It features "integrated services" to provide finance consumers with "complete information" on financial transactions here, especially via major search engines, such as Naver and Daum, according to the FSS.The new portal, it added,

Use of prepaid cards in South Korea almost halved in the second quarter of this year from three months earlier, government data showed Monday, as card firms are passive about the costly business.The country's prepaid card spending stood at 869.3 billion won ($765 million) in the April-June period, down 47.2 percent, or 164.8 billion won, from the prior quarter.It marks the first time since the second quarter of 2009 that quarterly prepaid card spending has fallen by more than 100 billion won.The

Shares held by foreign investors at South Korea's top30 listed firm have exceeded 315 trillion won (US$278 billion), data showed Sunday.According to the Financial Supervisory Service data submitted to the National Assembly, shares held by foreign investors were 67 percent of the total share ownership as of September. Tech giant Samsung Electronics Co. showed the highest ratio of foreign ownership at 36 percent, the data showed.Shares held by foreign investors exceeded 10 trillion at SK hynix, th

The United States has again included South Korea on its monitoring list of trading partners that may be pursuing unfair currency practices, according to a report by the US Department of Treasury on Saturday. This is the second consecutive report after an April issuance under the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act of 2015 in the US, which requires the Treasury Department to monitor key indicators related to foreign currency operations and economies that are deemed to be using unfair for

South Korea’s state-run depository insurance company said it will consider raising the threshold of protection money for depositors to better reflect the current size of the local economy.The Korea Depository Insurance Corp. provides protection of up to 50 million won ($44,000) in principal and interest per depositor, should a financial institution go bankrupt. The protection covers accounts in commercial banks, brokerages, insurers and savings banks. KDIC President Gwak Bum-gook (Yonhap) “The t