Retail sales index marks record drop in Q2 amid Homeplus fiasco
Shoppers purchase groceries at a Homeplus store in Seoul, Friday. Yonhap
The retail sales index at Korea's discount stores posted the sharpest year-on-year fall in the second quarter, partly due to the closure or operation suspension of stores at Homeplus, which is going through a corporate rehabilitation process, government data showed Sunday.
The retail sales index at Korea's discount store chains was 77.8 points in the April-June period, down 9.4 percent from the same three months in 2025, according to the data from the Ministry of Data and Statistics.
The index fell by the steepest level since the ministry started compiling such statistics in 2010, it said.
Massive closures of Homeplus stores were blamed for the decline, the ministry said. The discount store chain had closed 37 out of 104 offline outlets as of June due to the lack of operating capital and difficulties in maintaining store operations.
In early July, the Seoul Bankruptcy Court terminated rehabilitation proceedings for the troubled discount retailer.
Homeplus had temporarily suspended operations at its remaining 67 stores on July 13. But the company reopened them after the bankruptcy court canceled the earlier decision to end the company's rehabilitation proceedings, as its largest creditor, Meritz Financial Group, agreed to provide necessary financing.