Number of Companies Belonging to Large Business Groups Drops

The Korea Fair Trade Commission released data on the current status of companies belonging to large business groups consisting of those with a total asset of at least 10 trillion won and subject to cross-shareholding restrictions and those with a total asset of at least five trillion won and subject to the duty of disclosure.

According to the data, the number of those companies fell by 10 as 32 groups incorporated 66 companies and 27 groups excluded 76 companies from November 2019 to January 2020. Specifically, a total of 2,215 companies belonged to 59 large business groups as of Feb. 1.

When it comes to the 66 companies, 28 were newly founded, 10 were spun off and share acquisition occurred in 21. As for the 76, M&A occurred in 39, share disposal occurred in 10 and 18 were liquidated.

For example, Kakao incorporated Korea Kakao Bank and LG acquired CJ Hello and CJ Hello Hana Broadcasting from CJ. Lotte excluded eight financial and insurance companies by selling them. Nine groups, including POSCO, spun off 10 companies to incorporate them as subsidiaries and 39 companies disappeared as a result of acquisition or merger by subsidiaries in 14 groups such as SM.