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Anna J. Park

Korea Times Politics & City Reporter

Anna Jiwon Park has been covering the politics at The Korea Times since the summer of 2024, when she joined the press pool for the Office of the President in Korea. Prior to that, she spent about five years reporting extensively on financial markets, regulatory authorities and the financial industry. She joined The Korea Times in 2019 after spending eight years as a broadcast journalist at Arirang TV, Korea’s leading global broadcaster, covering politics, defense and culture.

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Economy

YouTuber appointed as FSS financial education ambassador

YouTuber Syuka, who has 2.78 million followers on his economy-focused YouTube channel, “syukaworld,” stands next to Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) Governor Lee Bok-hyun at the headquarters of FSS in Seoul, Wednesday. Syuka, whose real name is Jeon Seok-jae, used be a proprietary trader at eBest Investment and a fund manager at Samsung Asset Management, before becoming a YouTuber. The FSS said Syuka accepted the ambassador role for free, as he shares the need to strengthen public understanding of financial matters. Courtesy of FSS

Sep 6, 2023By Anna J. Park
YouTuber appointed as FSS financial education ambassador
Banking & Finance

Kakao CFO sanctioned for buying $75,000 in game items using corporate card

Kakao logo / NewsisBy Anna J. ParkKakao imposed a three-month suspension on the company's Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Kim Ki-hong for purchasing around 100 million won ($75,000) worth of game items using his corporate credit card. According to IT industry sources earlier this week, Kakao informed its employees the results of an ethics committee's review of the case. The ethics committee said it began investigating the case after it received tipoffs on the CFO's inappropriate use of his corporate card. After meeting several times, the ethics committee, composed of employees from various positions and age groups, concluded that the amount the CFO spent on game items was excessive, although payments on content developed by Kakao subsidiaries are an allowable expense with the firm's corporate credit cards. The committee also investigated whether there were attempts to exchange the purchased game items for cash. But that issue hasn't yet been confirmed. Kakao officials say the money spent on the items will be retrieved.“The amount of the problematic expense of the corporate card w

Sep 6, 2023By Anna J. Park
Kakao CFO sanctioned for buying $75,000 in game items using corporate card
Banking & Finance

Korea Gold Exchange put up for sale

gettyimagesbankBy Anna J. ParkThe Korea Gold Exchange and the Korea Gold Exchange Digital Asset (KORDA), trading platforms for precious metals, have been put up for sale. Their owners, SG Private Equity and LX Investment, have initiated the process to find new owners.According to the investment banking industry, NH Investment & Securities, the lead manager of the sale deal, plans to distribute a letter to potential buyers this week, in order to begin a preliminary demand survey. One hundred percent of the common shares of both the gold exchange and the digital trading platform are to be sold during the sale process. Some 67.2 percent of the shares of the two entities are held by a special purpose company (SPC) set up by SG Private Equity and LX Investment in 2018, while the rest of the shares are each held by two individuals. Founded in 2005, the Korea Gold Exchange is a company that deals with distributing and selling various precious metals, such as gold, silver and palladium, acquired from refining companies. The firm is also engaged in manufacturing and selling jewelry items;

Sep 5, 2023By Anna J. Park
Korea Gold Exchange put up for sale
Banking & Finance

Toss Bank launches simpler, safer 'jeonse' deposit loans

Toss Bank CEO Hong Min-taek speaks during a press conference at Conrad Seoul Hotel in Seoul, Tuesday. YonhapOverseas remittance service to be available during H2By Anna J. ParkToss Bank, one of Korea's three internet-based banks, launched a housing rental deposit loan product on Tuesday, aiming to innovate the country's cumbersome and complicated rent system. The loan product will be available for borrowers seeking to prepare the deposit money either for monthly housing rental contracts or for “jeonse” contracts. Jeonse is a unique lump-sum deposit payment in Korea for leasing a home for two years, without paying monthly installments to a landlord.Normally, it takes at least two to four weeks with many visits to an offline branch of a major bank in Korea for a borrower to get a rental deposit loan. That's because the borrower is required to submit various documents, including leasing contracts and legal certificates of income, employment and family relations, among other things. Toss Bank said it has streamlined the whole process, dispensing with the need to visit a bank

Sep 5, 2023By Anna J. Park
Toss Bank launches simpler, safer 'jeonse' deposit loans
Banking & Finance

Kakao's financial affiliates make foray into Thai market

Kakao Pay's office in Pangyo, Bundang District of Seongnam / Courtesy of Kakao PayBy Anna J. ParkKakao's financial subsidiaries are making their successful first foray into the Thai market, after choosing Thailand as the main target country of their overseas business expansion. Kakao Pay began providing its payment services in the country last week, following KakaoBank's partnering with Thailand's leading financial group in June to pursue a virtual banking license there.Considering even major domestic financial companies haven't yet encroached into the Southeast Asian country, due to the country's uniquely tight regulations on foreign financial firms, the incipient achievements by the Kakao affiliates in the largest economy of Southeast Asia are seen as a significant feat by market watchers. Since last week, Kakao Pay's mobile and online payment service has become available at over 3,000 shops, including major department stores, pharmacies and stores in Thailand, as Central Retail, which is Thailand's largest retail group, began supporting the use of the Korean payment service at the

Sep 4, 2023By Anna J. Park
Kakao's financial affiliates make foray into Thai market
Banking & Finance

Samsung Electronics stock price soars on foldable phones, AI chips

Samsung Electronics building in Seocho District in southern Seoul / Yonhap By Anna J. ParkThe stock price of Samsung Electronics has been on the rise for two consecutive trading sessions, following news of its supply of high-bandwidth memory product HBM3 to Nvidia.The stock price of the Korean tech giant ended at 71,200 won ($53.96) on Monday's closing, a 0.28 percent increase from Friday's session, continuing its upward trend since Friday.The price of Samsung Electronics soared to 71,000 won on Friday's session, marking a 6.13 percent increase from the previous day. This is the first time in a month that the stock price has reclaimed the 70,000 won mark since Aug. 1 when it closed at 71,100 won.Friday's surge is largely attributed to media reports earlier in the afternoon, announcing the Korean tech giant will start supplying NVIDIA with the fourth-generation HBM3, as early as next month. HBM is a standardized high-speed stacked memory technology, providing wide ch

Sep 1, 2023By Anna J. Park
Samsung Electronics stock price soars on foldable phones, AI chips
Banking & Finance

Savings banks suffer earnings declines in Q2 due to higher costs

A branch of SBI Savings Bank in Seoul / Yonhap By Anna J. ParkMajor savings banks saw earnings nosedive in the second quarter of this year compared to the same period of 2022 due to soaring costs stemming from rising interest rates.According to public disclosures by the country's top five savings banks in terms of asset size, their aggregate net profit during the second quarter stood at 10.2 billion won ($7.7 million), down a whopping 94.7 percent from a year ago when their quarterly net profit reached 190.7 billion won.The top five savings banks are SBI, OK, Welcome, Pepper, and Korea Investment savings banks.Among the five, SBI Savings Bank, which boasts the largest asset size, suffered the steepest fall in net profit in the second quarter compared to the same period last year. The bank's quarterly net profit in the second quarter stood at 6.8 billion won, down 92.1 percent year-on-year. OK Savings Bank suffered a 60.5 percent decrease in net profit over the same

Sep 1, 2023By Anna J. Park
Savings banks suffer earnings declines in Q2 due to higher costs
Banking & Finance

BNP Paribas continues to back women in Korean film industry

BNP Paribas Korea's Territory Head Aymar De Liedekerke Beaufort, right, presents the “BNP Paribas Asian Shorts Award” to winners during the closing ceremony of the Seoul International Women's Film Festival (SIWFF) at Sangnam Megabox in Seoul, Wednesday. BNP Paribas has been an official sponsor of the SIWFF since 2019. Courtesy of BNP Paribas Korea

Sep 1, 2023By Anna J. Park
BNP Paribas continues to back women in Korean film industry
Economy

CFD trading to partially resume with tighter regulations from September

Financial district of Yeouido in Seoul / gettyimagesbankBy Anna J. ParkLocal securities firms will partially resume contract for difference (CFD) trading from September, while financial regulations will be strengthened to prevent stock manipulation schemes utilizing the derivative products.A CFD is a high-risk leveraged derivative contract that allows speculation on short-term market movements, without having to own real assets.Out of 13 local securities firms that operated CFD trading, four of them ― Meritz Securities Korea, Kyobo Securities, Eugene Investment and Yuanta Securities ―- have decided to resume new trade services of CFD products from Sept. 1. The other eight brokerage companies, except SK Securities which completely withdrew from the CFD business, are examining when to resume the service.Trading of the derivative price difference contracts has largely been suspended at local securities companies since June, as massive stock manipulation schemes that broke out in April, allegedly led by Ra Deok-yeon, the head of an investment firm, were utilizing the loopholes of domesti

Aug 31, 2023By Anna J. Park
CFD trading to partially resume with tighter regulations from September
Banking & Finance

Woori Financial Group on track for carbon neutrality by 2050

The headquarters of Woori Financial Group in central Seoul / Courtesy of Woori Financial Group By Anna J. ParkWoori Financial Group announced, Thursday, that it obtained approval from the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) for the group's mid- and long-term carbon reduction targets. SBTi is a global body that partners with various international organizations, including the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), World Resources Institute (WRI), the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the United Nations Global Compact, to enable more than 6,000 businesses around the world to set carbon reduction targets. Based on recommendations by SBTi, Woori Financial Group has set one of the most stringent carbon emission reduction goals in its certification method among domestic financial companies. The group, in particular, fulfilled all criteria of the global initiative, including the application of the latest SBTi reduction methodologies, in its emission reduction targets. With the com

Aug 31, 2023By Anna J. Park
Woori Financial Group on track for carbon neutrality by 2050
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