Korea has recouped 60.9 percent of the public funds it injected to bail out troubled financial firms during the 1997-98 Asian financial crisis, the country's financial watchdog said Friday.
The country had recovered 102.6 trillion won ($91.7 billion) of a total of 168.6 trillion won in public funds as of the end of December, according to the Financial Services Commission (FSC).
The recovery rate marks around a 1 percentage point gain from 59.9 percent as of the end of 2010, it added.
The Korean government poured massive amounts of taxpayer money into troubled financial institutions to rescue them from bankruptcy when the financial crisis erupted in late 1997.
The watchdog said the country also had retrieved 1.62 trillion won, or 26.1 percent, of a total of 6.2 trillion won pumped in to stave off market instability in the aftermath of the 2008 global financial crisis.
Korea manages two tranches of public funds. The latter was created in 2009 in a bid to bolster the health of the local finance sector by helping buying out soured loans and assets of bankrupt firms. (Yonhap)