South Korea’s tax agency has handed down more than 80 billion won ($68.9 million) in taxation on the market’s top cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb, raising controversies on the lack of assessment standards.According to industry insiders, Vidente, the largest shareholder of Bithumb, announced Saturday via DART -- the Financial Supervisory Service’s electronic disclosure board -- that the National Tax Service has forced Bithumb to pay foreign customers’ withholding taxes wor

Hyundai Capital’s car-sharing service Deal Car has partnered with local small and medium-sized rental firms to help them digitalize their operations and platforms. According to the consumer financial service providing unit of Hyundai Motor Group, Deal Car has noticed key hurdles that traditional rental businesses now face in the digital age, including the struggle to find a digital alternative to face-to-face interactions for booking and passing of car keys. Through the partnership, Deal C

The world’s third-largest pension fund, South Korea’s National Pension Service, may opt to present shareholder proposals to its portfolio companies in Korea -- which number as many as 800 -- starting from Korea’s upcoming proxy season in March next year.The move, long awaited by civic groups that denounced chaebol families’ alleged misdeeds, comes as the public pension fund approved its shareholder engagement guidelines Friday, effective immediately. The latest action wou

Low-risk assets grow popular amid volatility

Korean brokerage Hana Financial Investment said Sunday that it had acquired a premium hotel in the US, marking its first acceptance financing business via strategic partnership. The brokerage firm on Tuesday acquired Hotel at the Mark, a 44-story building located in downtown Seattle that was previously owned by Hotel Lotte and private equity real estate investment management firm Stockbridge, officials said.Hotel Lotte joined in the $175 million deal as the consigned manager of the hotel. Starti

South Korea's financial regulator is planning to punish the heads of two commercial lenders for their improper sales of derivatives-linked products, industry sources said Sunday.According to the sources, the Financial Supervisory Service is set to punish the banks' heads in mid-January.In October, the FSS said about 20 percent of 3,954 cases detected may violate law or internal rules in selling the derivatives, but further investigation is needed into the two leading lenders -- Woori Bank and KE

South Korean stocks are predicted to stay mostly flat next week as investors are expected to sit on the sidelines amid the possibility of a provocation by North Korea, analysts said Saturday. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) closed at 2,204.21 points on Friday, little changed from the previous week.Earlier in the week, the market closed lower as investors took a breather and cashed in recent gains after the market hit an almost eight-month high on Friday, buoyed

South Korean shares opened lower Friday as investors cashed in recent profits ahead of the final trading session of 2019 slated for next week. But major tech stocks continued to build up gains.The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index fell 13.41 points, or 0.61 percent, to 2,184.52 in the first 15 minutes of trading. In South Korea, investors should buy stocks one day before the last trading day of the year to receive dividends. The final trading session of 2019 is Monday.US stocks continu

NH Investment & Securities, the country’s second-largest securities firm by net assets, launched a hedge fund company as its own subsidiary, the company said Thursday.NH Hedge Asset Management will be led by CEO Lee Dong-hoon, the former head of the hedge fund division at NH Investment & Securities.In August 2016, the securities firm launched the hedge fund division and has operated the NH Absolute Return Fund worth 700 billion won ($603 million) and NH Pre-IPO Mezzanine Fund worth

South Korea’s secondary bourse Kosdaq is expected to enjoy the “January effect” in 2020, as it has historically performed strongest in the first month of the year, analysts said Monday. According to stock market operator Korea Exchange, the increase rate of Kosdaq’s index in January has been seven times that of the main bourse Kospi since 2010. In January 2018, the Kosdaq index surged 14.42 percent, while Kospi increased 4.01 percent on-year. In January 2014, Kosdaq rose

South Korean companies are increasingly becoming key players of mergers and acquisitions in the global game industry, in pursuit of fresh revenue sources and growth engines, data showed on Thursday.From 2013 to 2018, Korea ranked No. 4 in global M&A transactions in the industry, according to Samjong KPMG in its report titled “Global M&A Trends in Game Industry.”  Of the total 528 deals globally, Korean entities proposed, signed and closed a combined 45 deals, followed by

The delinquency rate for South Korean banks' won-denominated loans edged up in October from a month earlier due to a slight hike in bad loans extended to firms and households, data showed Thursday.The rate for bank loans more than 30-days overdue stood at 0.46 percent at the end of October, up 0.02 percentage point from a month earlier, according to the data from the Financial Supervisory Service.But compared with a year ago, the rate was down 0.12 percentage point, it said.The delinquency rate

At the end of a sluggish year, South Korea is gradually coming to anticipate the recovery of its consumer goods stocks, placing its hopes on the latest trilateral talk with China and Japan.The key point of interest comes down to whether Seoul will break free of the consequences of economic retaliatory measures taken by Beijing in response to the deployment of an advanced US missile defense system in 2016.On Tuesday, the leaders of the three Northeast Asian states reaffirmed their shared goals of

The combined assets of the overseas subsidiaries of South Korean financial groups have expanded nearly 40 percent over the past three years, data showed Wednesday.According to data by the state-run Korea Deposit Insurance Corp., the total assets owned by overseas subsidiaries of South Korea’s major 10 financial groups tallied 61.6 trillion won ($529.2 billion) as of end-June.The list includes Shinhan Financial Group, Hana Financial Group, Woori Financial Group, KB Financial Group, JB Finan

Reflecting the slowing economy and prolonged low interest rates, investors here have increasingly turned their eyes to real estate, gold and overseas securities, South Korea’s stock market operator said Wednesday.Based on a survey of industry experts and media correspondents, the Korea Exchange selected its top 10 news stories about the domestic stock and derivative markets this year.A representative phenomenon was the soaring demand for real estate investment trusts, or REITs, led by the