Capital Outflow
The Financial Supervisory Service announced on March 21 that 35 foreign bank branches in South Korea recorded a net profit of 1.5 trillion won (US$1.1 billion) last year, up 40 percent from a year ago.
“Their profit related to derivatives increased a lot with regard to exchange and interest rate movements,” it said, adding, “Specifically, this profit increased from 4.7 trillion won [US$3.6 billion] to 9.9 trillion won [US$7.6 billion] in 2022.”
The branches’ interest revenue decreased more than 10 percent to 1.6 trillion won (US$1.2 billion). Their marketable securities and foreign exchange losses were 2.8 trillion won (US$2.1 billion) and 6 trillion won (US$4.6 billion), respectively.
“Their credit cost increased 59.7 billion won [US$45.7 million] to 49.2 billion won [US$37.7 million] and this has to do with NPL increase, allowance reversal, and so on,” it explained.