Credit card issuers are grappling to find a new growth engine in a saturated local financial market by mapping out projects to make inroads into foreign countries.Their movement, however, faces deadlock amid protectionist stances in China and some Southeast Asian countries, officials in the non-banking industry said Thursday.A Lotte Card official stressed that the credit card business is one of the hardest sectors to expand overseas.“Major card firms with excellent products and services have fai

Big retailers stopped offering sales based on interest-free monthly installments, as a protest against the revised laws which would burden both credit card firms and card settlement membership stores for additional costs. Despite customers’ complaints due to the unexpected halt of the zero-interest installment sales, retail chains including E-mart, online shopping mall G-market, Shinsegae Department Store and other retailers decided to ban the zero-interest installment promotions.The long-standi

Global tech titans are expected to stage a fierce competition for the dominant operating system for smart devices this year, as Samsung and Microsoft seek to reenter the market with “Tizen” and “Windows 8,” respectively, and Apple and Google are expected to bring forward the launch dates for new products. The world’s bestselling smartphone maker Samsung will launch smartphones with the new operating system “Tizen” in January in Japan, a local report said, citing Samsung officials. OS giant Intel

Sony Corp. is in talks to sell its battery business to Japan’s state-backed investment fund, said a person with direct knowledge of the negotiations. Innovation Network Corp. of Japan hasn’t made an offer for the acquisition, said the person, who declined to be identified as the information isn’t public. Taiwan’s Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., the world’s largest contract maker of electronics, has also shown interest in the buyout, the Nikkei newspaper reported Dec. 22. Sony’s Chief Executive O

The monthly fee for freely listening to music online is expected to more than double next year.The nation’s largest online music service portal Melon has decided to raise its current 3,000 won monthly plan, which provides unlimited access to listen to its music, to 6,000 won, sources said. The price of Melon’s monthly plan to download up to 150 songs will also rise, from 9,000 won to 15,000 won, according to the sources. LOEN Entertainment Inc., which runs Melon, said on Tuesday that the new rat

The Korea Communications Commission decided Monday to slap business suspension penalties and fines on the nation’s three telecoms for having offered excessive subsidies to attract customers.The state telecom regulator agreed on Monday during a general meeting to penalize the three mobile carriers ― SK Telecom, KT and LG Uplus ― which gave out more financial subsidies to the customers than entitled by the law, despite the regulator’s continued warnings.Starting from Jan. 7, the business ban will