Hana Financial Group said Friday it had inked a sales and purchase agreement with the Korea Teachers’ Credit Union to buy a 70 percent stake in The-K Non-Life Insurance for 77 billion won ($65.1 million). This is the first acquisition deal for Korea’s third-largest banking group since the takeover of Korea Exchange Bank in 2013. The-K Non-Life will become the 14th affiliate and second insurer arm to be under Hana’s umbrella. KTCU will remain a minority shareholder of t

South Korean state-owned lender the Korea Development Bank has borne fruit with its investment in the nation’s cultural contents, officials said Friday. Already generating profits from its investment in Big Hit Entertainment, the agency of global K-pop sensation BTS, the banking group is also expecting considerable returns from its investment in Oscar-winning film “Parasite.” KDB Capital, an affiliate of KDB, invested nearly 700 million won ($591,000), including a direct inv

A coalition of Korean Air heiress and a local activist fund Korea Corporate Governance Improvement on Thursday proposed former SK Group Vice Chairman Kim Shin-bae as an inside board director of Hanjin Group in a bid to oust the current chairman at the March shareholders meeting. Other candidates include former Samsung Electronics Vice President and head of China Bae Kyung-tae and ex-Korean Air executive Kim Chi-hoon. Hahm Chul-ho, a former Korean Air senior vice president and T’way Air CE

The nation’s financial watchdog plans to refer Woori Bank’s alleged information-theft case to the prosecution for investigation, according to internal documents acquired by a lawmaker Thursday. The bank’s employees allegedly changed passwords of around 40,000 customers without permission to improve its balance sheet. According to Financial Supervisory Service documents acquired by a lawmaker, the watchdog plans to send the case to “investigative authorities later on.&r

NH Financial Group, a major Korean banking group, vowed Wednesday to increase its global assets by nearly five times to 6 trillion won ($5.1 billion) by 2025, as part of its new global expansion strategy. According to the financial giant, its overseas assets stood at nearly 1.4 trillion won as of the end of December. It also plans to increase its net profit to 160 billion won in the same period, which came to 28.9 billion won as of December. NH Financial said it would expand its overseas

Woori Financial Group on Tuesday announced the appointment of the new head of its flagship commercial banking unit, in a move that is projected to further escalate its tension with the financial authorities here. The financial giant’s chairman and executive recommendation committee tapped Kwon Kwang-seok, head of the Korea Federation of Community Credit Cooperative’s credit business, to replace current Woori Bank CEO Sohn Tae-seung. Sohn, who has been reappointed as the financia

South Korea’s logistics startup Mesh Korea -- operator of algorithm-powered micro delivery service Vroong -- denied rumors Monday that it is selling the stakes of its executives, amid a growing conflict between its CEO and other major stakeholders. The deal manager Samjong KPMG is reportedly looking for potential investors in Mesh Korea’s newly issued stocks and shares of existing investors. The exact stake a new investor will control remains unknown, while 

South Korea’s financial watchdog, the Financial Supervisory Service, has become the target of criticism for having failed to prevent the recent fiasco involving derivatives-linked funds. The state-run agency is also accused of trying to duck responsibility for the incident, which involved two of the largest banking groups here. The FSS on Monday decided to impose sanctions on the CEOs of major banking groups --  Woori Financial Group and Hana Financial Group -- which will have

South Korea’s Woori Financial Group on Thursday said its current chief would maintain his role for the time being despite sanctions imposed by financial authorities for misselling of derivatives-linked funds. The announcement came as a result of a preliminary board meeting, on the eve of the regular board meeting scheduled Friday. Woori Financial’s seven board members, including Chairman Sohn Tae-seung, gathered with the goal of releasing a statement conveying the chairman’s

South Korea’s public pension fund, the National Pension Service, is now gearing up for new committees to ramp up the shareholder engagement push for its portfolio firms here at an unprecedented level. But time appears to be running short ahead of the March proxy season in Korea. The NPS’ Fund Management Committee has to start from scratch to forge a fully fledged decision-making system to shortlist companies under what is equivalent to a “focus list” by the California P

Seoul-based asset management giant Mirae Asset Global Investments said Wednesday that the net asset value of its exchange-traded fund invested in the US-based Nasdaq has surpassed 100 billion won. Mirae’s Tiger Nasdaq 100 ETF tracks 100 companies listed on America’s tech-heavy stock market Nasdaq including Microsoft, Apple and Amazon. Having gained total returns of 391.03 percent since October 2010, the net worth of the company’s fund has doubled from 56.5 billion won in 201

Seoul-based private equity house Hahn & Co. agreed to buy SK Chemicals’ biofuel operation for 382.5 billion won ($322.2 million) in cash on Wednesday. The proposed acquisition of South Korea’s No. 1 biodiesel producer marks the first deal to be announced since Hahn & Co. closed a new Korea-focused fund worth $3.2 billion in October last year, a Hahn & Co. official said. As of end-2018, SK Chemicals took up one-third of market share here by biodiesel production. This c

South Korea’s state-led fund of funds manager Korea Growth Investment (K-Growth) said Wednesday it plans to earmark a combined 5.4 trillion won ($4.5 billion) risk capital to spur venture investments across the nation in 2020. The company said it aims to raise at least 1 trillion won for its portfolio, adding to the 1.6 trillion won from its flagship fund of funds. The majority of the funds worth 3.3 trillion won will be used to nurture startups for later-stage funding rounds, K-Growth

Ahead of Danaher’s acquisition of General Electric’s biopharmaceutical unit for $21.4 billion, South Korea’s Fair Trade Commission on Tuesday ordered either of the two firms to divest certain assets in its conditional approval. The latest decision, according to the antitrust watchdog, is meant to thwart monopoly in Korea’s bioprocessing market. The order forces either Danaher or GE’s biopharma unit to sell off the entire eight bioprocessing product assets in Kore

Top executives and board face tough decisions concerning governance, relations with financial authorities