Prime Minister Lee Nak-yon instructed the Cabinet on Tuesday to come up with stronger codes of conduct for public servants after a financial watchdog official was found to have profited from information on cryptocurrency regulations.According to a government inspection, the Financial Supervisory Service worker earned about 7 million won ($6,550) in profit from selling about half of his virtual currency holdings last month, just two days before the government announced a package of measures aimed

Six South Korean banks will begin issuing new trading accounts for cryptocurrencies next week by introducing a system that bans the use of anonymous accounts in cryptocurrency transactions, a senior financial regulator said Tuesday.When the banks introduce the system of verifying cryptocurrency investors' identification next Tuesday, current virtual accounts for virtual coins will be banned the same day, Kim Yong-beom, vice chairman of the Financial Services Commission, told reporters.Financial

WASHINGTON -- The United States on Monday issued safeguard measures on imports of large residential washing machines and solar cells, in a potential blow to South Korean manufacturers.US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer announced the measures were approved by President Donald Trump."The (US) ITC (International Trade Commission) found that US producers had been seriously injured by imports and made several recommendations to the President," he said in a written statement. "Th

The Export-Import Bank of Korea and Korea Trade Insurance Corporation (K-sure) signed a memorandum of understanding Monday to help Korean companies secure more construction and shipbuilding projects overseas and create jobs. Eun Sung-soo, chief of the Eximbank, and Moon Jae-do, head of K-sure, vowed to enhance cooperation for policy support on bidders looking to win overseas projects, in a meeting held Monday in Eximbank headquarters in Yeouido, Seoul.  Eximbank and K-sure agreed to share i

Kakao Bank, South Korea’s biggest direct bank, announced Monday it would start selling housing deposit loan products for either a two-year period jeonse (lease with down payment) contract or monthly rent, from Tuesday.A face-to-face process when submitting documents will not be required, like other products of the online-only bank, partly with the help of scraping technologies that enable the bank to extract documents regarding housing deposit loan borrowers’ identification.The annou

Measures taken by President Moon Jae-in’s administration to curb home prices have resulted in deepening the polarization of the local housing market.Betraying policymakers’ expectations, the prices of expensive apartments in Seoul, which were mainly targeted by tighter mortgage rules and other restrictive steps, have continued to rise, while house prices in most provincial areas are on a downward trend.Largely affected by a set of restrictive measures announced on six occasions since

The government said Monday it will collect up to 24.2 percent of corporate and local income taxes from South Korea's cryptocurrency exchanges this year.The Seoul government has been striving to rein in the virtual currency frenzy in Asia's fourth-largest economy while contemplating a bill to ban cryptocurrency exchanges.Amid concerns over a bubble, the government last month banned the opening of new virtual accounts for cryptocurrency investors and required virtual currency traders to change the

The local business community on Monday continued to strongly dispute the government's argument that the raised minimum wage will eventually help the economy, dismissing such reasoning as outdated.Finance Minister Kim Dong-yeon on Jan. 11 cited results of the minimum wage increases that took place in 2000 and 2007, when the job market was affected by higher hiring costs in the short run but stabilized after just a few months. His deputy, Koh Hyeong-gwon, on the same day at a different government

The World Bank Group has launched a special recruitment drive on selected global and regional functions, offering priority to Korean nationals, according to the Ministry of Strategy and Finance on Sunday.“A total of 11 jobs are available as of today, and other positions may be added to the list later,” the ministry said in a press release, encouraging Korean nationals to bid for the jobs.The range of functions vary from energy, investment and the public sector to legal consulting, wi

This is the 49th in a series of articles analyzing major companies traded on the tech-heavy Kosdaq market. -- Ed.On South Korea‘s second-tier stock market, not only tech and bio companies are on the rise, but also one unique industry has been steadily growing: education services. Reflecting the country’s high enthusiasm for education and aspirations for better jobs, education services companies have been gaining presence in the market dominated by tech companies. MegaStudyEdu, a test

The government plans to require banks and exchanges to keep records of cryptocurrency transactions, in a potential move to impose taxes on the largely covert deals, financial authorities said Sunday.Coming in the wake of the government’s earlier order to convert all cryptocurrency accounts into real-name accounts, the idea reflected Seoul‘s efforts to assume control of the overheated market.The Korea Financial Intelligence Unit is currently working on a set of anti-money laundering g

South Korea's top financial regulator said Sunday that it will tighten capital regulations on high-risk household lending, in the latest move meant to slow the pace of household debt growth. The stricter regulations will be applied to banks, savings banks and insurance firms that provide loans to home buyers of more than 60 percent of a property's value, the Financial Services Commission said in a statement. To encourage financial institutions to channel funds into the corporate sector, the FSC

Among cryptocurrency exchanges around the world, the one with the largest volume of transactions is based in South Korea, showed data from tallying website CoinMarketCap. As of 10:40 a.m. Thursday, the transaction volume for 24 hours at Upbit based in South Korea reached $7.577 billion, far ahead of Hong Kong’s Binance, which ranked second.Except for the No. 1 and No. 3 spots, most exchanges with large transactions were located in Hong Kong and China. Although Upbit topped the world market

A high-ranking Ministry of Justice official on Thursday described cryptocurrency founders as scammers and insisted that any purchase of encrypted coins in Korea translates into an outflow of cash.Shim Jae-chul, an official at Justice Ministry in charge of policy and planning, said in a panel session held in the National Assembly Thursday that the recent cryptocurrency speculation in Korea stems from coin founders’ proclamation that their coins would turn into an alternative to gold or a me