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This file photo, taken March 2, 2021, shows ships carrying containers docking at a port in South Korea's southeastern port city of Busan. (Yonhap) |
The portion of South Korean exports settled using the country's currency inched down in 2020 from a year ago, data showed Thursday.
The use of the won accounted for 2.5 percent of all export settlements last year, down 0.1 percentage point from a year earlier, according to the data from the Bank of Korea (BOK).
The slight decline was attributed to Washington's economic sanctions on Tehran for its nuclear program, which led to decreased use of the won in settling exports to the Middle East.
Won-based settlements of exports to the Middle East fell 0.4 percentage point in 2020, according to the data.
South Korean firms have been using the country's monetary unit to settle trade with Middle Eastern companies since 2010.
The US dollar was the dominant currency used to settle South Korean exports last year, taking up 83.6 percent of overall export settlements. Comparable figures were 6.2 percent for the euro and 2.9 percent for the Japanese yen.
The share of won-based import settlements stood at 7 percent last year, up 1.1 percentage point from the previous year, with the use of the US dollar falling 2.5 percentage points to 78.1 percent, according to the BOK data. (Yonhap)
