A man surnamed Kim, who is in his 30s, managed to borrow 2 million won ($1,504) from a credit card company, just days before his loan from a different card company was about to mature.
The combined net income of local commercial lenders will fall to 19.6 trillion won ($14.9 billion) next year from 21.6 trillion won this year, led by a slowdown in healthy asset growth associated with credit risks, and compounded by reductions in net interest margins (NIM) due to declining interest rates, according to a private think tank.
Insurance companies will be allowed to acquire non-insurance firms overseas as early as the second half of this year. The move is part of policy directions announced earlier this week by the Financial Services Commission (FSC), the country s top financial regulator, aiming to strengthen local insurers global competitiveness and foster long-term growth potential.
While housing prices continued to rise in many countries during the third quarter this year, Korea turned out to be the country that posted the biggest fall globally in average housing prices during the period. According to U.K.-headquartered real estate company Knight Frank s quarterly “Global House Price Index” published for Q3 this year, Korea s housing prices fell by 7.5 percent in nominal terms during the quarter, compared to a year ago.
Amid the soaring global interest rates and faltering stock market actions, small and mid-sized local brokerage companies are focusing on increasing liquidity in preparation for market uncertainties stemming from macroeconomic changes.