Listed Firms' Profits Fall Sharply in 2019

Financial data provider FnGuide said that the total cash dividend of 100 listed subsidiaries of the top 10 business groups as of March 24 is 19,425.5 billion won. For reference, the amount hit an all-time high of 20,628.9 billion won in 2018 with the stewardship code introduced and the business groups enhancing their shareholder return policies.

According to industry estimates, the annual operating profit of KOSPI-listed companies dropped 30.3 percent to 137.7 trillion won and their net profit plummeted by 45.2 percent to 71.4 trillion won last year. In addition, the average estimate of the companies’ operating profit for the first quarter of this year has been recently lowered by 4.8 percent from a month ago due to the spread of COVID-19 and international oil price fluctuations.

Last year, SK Group reduced its dividend from 2,899.4 billion won to 2,122.4 billion won. SK Hynix and SK Innovation reduced theirs from 1,026 billion won to 684 billion won and from 698.3 billion won to 260.9 billion won, respectively.

LG Group’s dividend fell 18.2 percent to 1,080.9 billion won, too. Especially, LG Chem’s dividend dropped from 413.6 billion won to 137.9 billion won. Lotte Group and Hanwha Group curtailed their dividends from 701 billion won to 534.7 billion won and from 187.1 billion won to 120.7 billion won, respectively.

Meanwhile, Samsung Group’s dividend edged down from 11,685.8 billion won to 11,629.2 billion won and those of Hyundai Motor Group and POSCO Group, 2,272.8 billion won and 925.2 billion won, showed no substantial decrease.

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