Korea's NPS upped alternative investment by 33% in 2021

The National Pension Service (NPS) of South Korea committed 204.4 trillion won ($156.7 billion) to alternative investment as of end-2021, up 32.7% f...

SK seeks to build EV charger plant in US on subsidies

SK Group, South Korea’s No. 2 conglomerate, is seeking to build an electric vehicle charger plant in the US in a move to accelerate the expans...

Conglomerates lead loan growth to record high in July

South Korea's large business groups led a sharp increase in bank lending in July, driving the corporate bank loan growth to a record high, central b...

NXP expands cooperation with Korean security startups

NXP Semiconductors NV, a global leading automotive chipmaker, is expanding partnerships with South Korean security startups to secure new semiconduc...

Korea Inc. rushes to cut debt as interest rates surge

South Korean companies scrambled for lowering debts and borrowing costs with new financial and business strategies as interest rates on corporate lo...

Japan’s multifamily assets shine amid market volatility: Savills IM

Multifamily assets have been a key investment target due to their resilience amid economic volatility. Japan, with the largest real estate market in...

KIC taps investment strategy head Lee Hoon as CIO

Korea Investment Corporation (KIC) is set to appoint Lee Hoon, the senior managing director and head of the investment strategy & innovation d...

S.Korean startup Time Percent gives power to digital asset investors 

South Korean startup Time Percent Corp. was founded a year ago with the specific goal of giving power to the investors of digital assets, rather tha...

Korean firms rush to sell real estate to raise cash

South Korean companies are selling real estate and subsidiaries to raise cash as accelerating inflation, rising interest rates and the soft won all ...

SK Square makes its first exit seeking new target firms

South Korean investment firm SK Square Co. has sold all of its shares in Korean biotech NanoEntek Inc., a 28.4% stake, for 58 billion won ($44.3 mil...

IGIS, KKR to buy Shinhan Investment HQ for $487 mn

A consortium led by South Korea’s IGIS Asset Management Co. and US private equity giant KKR & Co. is set to acquire Shinhan Investment Cor...

KB Asset aims for first IPO of Korea's homegrown infrastructure fund

South Korea’s KB Asset Management Co. is set to list its Balhae Infrastructure Fund (Balhae) on the country’s main bourse Kospi in the s...

S.Korea’s 5G, cryptography likely to be adopted as global standards

South Korea’s five technologies on 5G mobile networks, cloud computing and cryptography have been preliminarily chosen as global standards, a ...

South Korea’s Mirae Asset Group bets $100 million on SpaceX

Mirae Asset Securities Co. is poised to invest $100 million in US spacecraft and satellite communication corporation SpaceX. The South Korean f...

The case for improved Seoul-Tokyo relations

Unlike the West or China, which showed vastly different reactions, most South Koreans had a more complicated initial response to the news of forme...

Korean firms eye alternative assets for safer investments, survey finds

South Korean corporates are increasingly eyeing alternative assets seeking downside protection amid interest rate hikes and equity and bond price dr...

Sell Korea intensifies as foreigners dump bonds for 1st time in 18 months

A selloff in risk assets in South Korea is intensifying as foreigners turned net sellers of Korean bonds for the first time in 18 months in June whi...

NPS sees 14 investment managers resign by end-June

National Pension Service (NPS) of South Korea sees as many as 14 professionals of its investment management arm resign by end-June of this year, acc...

Korean retirement funds, mutual aids struggle with profitability

Some major retirement funds in South Korea are raising interest rates on their members’ savings accounts in line with global central banks&rsq...

Korean companies' net issuance of bonds in H1 hits six-year low

South Korea’s net issuance of corporate bonds during the first half of 2022 was its lowest in six years, according to Korea Financial Investme...

Korea faces risk from record $114 bn in inventory assets

South Korea’s major listed companies held record inventory assets as they piled up raw materials to deal with the global supply chain disrupti...

Korean biotech L&C Bio issues convertible bonds worth $46 mn

South Korean biotech company L&C Bio, which specializes in tissue regeneration treatment, is poised to ramp up its expansion into the Chinese ma...

SK Materials, Showa Denko to jointly seek US semiconductor gas business

SK Materials Co., an industrial gas manufacturing affiliate of South Korea’s SK Inc., and Japanese chemicals company Showa Denko K.K. have agr...

South Korea to invest $794 million in AI chips, nurture 7,000 experts

The South Korean government has decided to invest 1.02 trillion won ($794 million) in the artificial intelligence semiconductor sector and foster ov...

SK Ecoplant to inject $100 mn in Korean solar energy firm Topsun

South Korea's top waste management company SK Ecoplant Co., a unit of conglomerate SK Inc., is slated to complete talks to invest 130 billion won ($...

[ASK 2022]  Tailored strategies outperform in European credit market: Arrow Global

 As a leading European private credit asset manager, Arrow Global operates its own servicing platforms that most accurately fit E...

Residential, urban logistics in Europe are attractive: Patrizia

Despite a number of global market uncertainties, there is value in real assets where rental income grows faster than inflation, Mahdi Mokrane, head ...

More LPs tap ex-Samsung Life professionals as CIOs

A number of financial experts who built their careers at Samsung Life Insurance Co. are in the spotlight as more South Korean pension funds and mutu...

Tech experts to discuss future mega-trends at KIF 2022

The Korea Investment Festival (KIF), the largest annual investor relations (IR) event in South Korea, will be held June 29-30 at the Fairmont Ambass...

Korea webtoon startup Kenaz acquired by hedge fund

South Korea’s leading webtoon production startup Kenaz was taken over by a domestic hedge fund as it aims to reduce dependence on major platfo...