The Korea Times

FSC Chairman warns of eurozone crisis

By Kang Seung-woo The sovereign debt problems gripping European economies could blow up later this year or early 2012 to send the global economy into another downward spiral, according to a senior Korean policymaker. Such external negatives may rattle the stability of Korea’s financial system, with the country already struggling with historically-high household debt, Financial Services Commission (FSC) Chairman Kim Seok-dong told a forum in Seoul Thursday. “I expect it will be difficult to control the debt crisis in the eurozone, so the problem is likely to ‘burst’ in the fourth quarter of this year or early next year,” Kim said in an event organized by British business magazine the Economist.

Sep 15, 2011By Kang Seung-woo

Companies

Korean banks could collapse within 3 months of a crisis

By Kang Seung-woo Multiple local commercial banks could collapse within three months if the current credit crunch in Europe evolves into another global financial crisis, a stress test showed Thursday. As part of countermeasures to a worst-case scenario, the country’s financial authorities have ordered lenders to strengthen their foreign currency liquidity by the end of this year. The Financial Services Commission (FSC) and its executive unit, the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS), said Thursday that they carried out simulations in late August to test how well Korea’s 18 commercial banks are prepared to withstand a potential global financial crisis in terms of foreign currency liquidity. They did not specify how many players could not pass the rigorous test but a majority failed to make the cut. “The stress test on banks was strict enough to presume a crisis as big as that of 2008. The financial regulators are calling for them to substantially beef up their foreign exchange liquidity conditions to satisfy guidelines by the end of the year,” an FSS official said.

Sep 15, 2011By Kang Seung-woo

Companies

Personal info leaks spook Samsung Card

CEO apology mistakenly pigeonholed for days By Kang Seung-woo Samsung Card President Choi Chi-hun apologized to its customers Wednesday for the unintentional leak of their personal information that was reported to police Aug. 30. Choi’s apology came amid a group-wide fight initiated by its leader Lee Kun-hee, chairman of the flagship Samsung Electronics, against incompetence. By many indications, the response appears to be a knee-jerk reaction to public criticism, casting doubt on his ability. “Although the exact extent of the damage has not been determined, it was found that our customers’ personal identification numbers (PINs) or account numbers were not stolen," Choi said. Interestingly enough, the apology was made through the firm’s website Friday but it was little known before Yonhap News, the state-run wire service, picked it up. The Chuseok holiday began Saturday and lasted until Tuesday but it baffles industry people as to why it took so long to get the apology publicized. “We will make efforts to prevent the recurrence of such incidents in the future b

Sep 14, 2011By Kang Seung-woo

Companies

Greenberg is optimistic salesman

By Oh Young-jin Selling insurance is a difficult proposition. To be a good insurance salesperson, one first has to overcome fears of being rejected by potential customers. Then, it is pivotal to making the customers feel reassured enough to pay for and buy a policy. For anybody who has bought a policy, it is well known that the biggest challenge is a psychological threshold that keeps the buyer from paying for an eventuality that may never come. That threshold is brought to a low a point when you talk with Brian Greenberg, president of ACE Life. To be fair, when he had the interview with The Korea Times, it was over dinner and there was no selling and buying of any policies but it was only at the end of two hours of dining when we understood that he was a very good insurance salesperson. Anxious to confirm whether he is a falling-out-of-the-sky CEO or one who has climbed the corporate ladder rung by rung, one of our two-reporter team blurted that question out. “I have sold insurance since 1967,” he answered, pointing out in good humor that the younger reporter was

Sep 9, 2011By Kang Seung-woo

Companies

Two thirds of dead cremated

By Kang Seung-woo Cremation is fast replacing traditional burial customs in Korea with nearly seven out of 10 corpses cremated last year, almost double from 10 years ago, a government report showed Friday. The government plans to increase the number of crematoriums as the practice is expected grow. According to the Ministry of Health and Welfare, 172,276 out of 255,403 Koreans who died in 2010 were cremated, accounting for 67.5 percent. The figure is more than double the 33.7 percent registered in 2000. The average number of people who were cremated daily rose from 440 in 2009 to 472 in 2010, the ministry said. Cremation outnumbered burials for the first time in 2005, and continues to increase by over 3 percentage points annually. It is expected to reach nearly 80 percent in 2020. The ministry attributed the rise of cremation to its cleanness, convenience and easy management. “Cremation has become the most popular option as it is easier, more hygienic and costs less (than burials),” the ministry said. In tandem with the report, a survey conducted earlier this

Sep 9, 2011By Kang Seung-woo

Companies

ACE Life pushes limits of opportunity

CEO of brand-new insurer predicts big growth despite global economic difficulties By Kang Seung-woo The Korean life insurance segment is thought to be overflowing with 23 entities struggling to gain market share. Consequently, insurers naturally feel the need to go overseas as a sustainable growth engine. This is not so for newly-born ACE Life Korea and its CEO Brian Greenberg. It is the other way around and for them Korea is still the land of opportunities. “Samsung Life, Kyobo Life and Korea Life are big organizations, so a 10 percent growth for them is a big number, but we are a small company. Compared to them, a 30 percent or 40 percent growth is not a big number for us. So I can get to a size and it makes sense for me,” the London native said in an interview with The Korea Times. “Asian population gives a different product opportunity and you also see some more breakups of family. With that breakup of family, the family no longer lives together with a lot more singles and a lot more childless couples. “Therefore, you have more niche development and more

Sep 9, 2011By Kang Seung-woo

Companies

Financial firms merciless on debtors

By Kang Seung-woo A man in his mid-50s reported to the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) that a credit card firm seized and cancelled his family’s insurance policies due to a failure to repay his debt from the issuer. The man, whose wife and son are sick, said that he cannot take care of them without the insurance payments. According to the nation’s financial watchdog, financial institutions have applied to courts to seize and cancel insurance policies of 76,076 defaulters this year in measures to retrieve funds. Private money lenders, notorious for illegal debt collection methods, topped the list by taking the insurance payments of 40,646 people, followed by credit card issuers at 18,569, savings banks at 9,123, and banks at 1,200. The number of those who are taken by financial companies in the first half this year has nearly doubled from a year earlier ― from 36,463 to 71,554. The FSS assumed that half of the insurance policies were those that paid to cover medical fees for injury and illness. “The data shows that financial institutions deprived indebted people

Sep 7, 2011By Kang Seung-woo

Companies

Rip-off jean merchants

Diesel, Dsquared, D&G and True Religion sell for 10 times wholesale prices By Kang Seung-woo Kim Youn-soo, a 28-year-old style aficionado, used to put on a pair of True Religion jeans when she was in the United States during her internship. However, since her return here, she has never thought about purchasing the premium denims in Korea because the price tags here are preposterously much higher than those in America both on- and off-line. “It does not make sense at all that the gap in price between the two countries is so even when taking tariffs into consideration,” Kim said.

Sep 7, 2011By Kang Seung-woo

Companies

FSS opposes credit financing

By Kang Seung-woo The head of the nation’s financial watchdog asked CEOs of local financial investment companies to refrain from high-risk leveraged investments Wednesday. “Amid growing volatility in the financial market, the number of individual investors who tend to leverage money through credit financing, equity-linked warrants (ELW) and foreign exchange margin trades has been on the rise,” Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) Governor Kwon Hyouk-se said in a meeting with 25 chief executives of financial investors. He added that leveraged investment is vulnerable to price fluctuations, so investment firms are required to reduce the proportion of investment in order to secure soundness in the market as well as protect clients’ assets. Kwon praised recent actions by the companies to stop or limit investment. “It is significant that a few brokerage houses voluntarily stop the foreign exchange margin trade and cap credit financing,” he said. Mirae Asset Securities surprisingly suspended its credit financing and downsized the credit line for fresh loans on Aug. 16, whi

Sep 7, 2011By Kang Seung-woo

Companies

’Sleeper cards’ increase amid economic blues

By Kang Seung-woo One fourth of credit cards issued by local companies are left unused, the nation’s financial watchdog said Monday. In addition, up to 3 trillion won was spent on their issuance, a burden imposed on consumers directly or indirectly. According to the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS), the number of credit cards unused for payments for 12 months came to 32.95 million as of the end of June this year, up 1.66 million from six months ago, and accounts for 25 percent of all issued cards, which total 122.31 million. A dormant credit card means it is not used for more than 12 months. According to the Credit Finance Association (CFA), an economically active person in Korea carries an average of 4.8 credit cards. Inactive credit cards have been an upward trend of late. The number of unused cards, which stood at 29.8 million at the end of 2006, dropped to 22.9 million in 2007. With the number of credit defaulters diminishing, issuers have launched aggressive campaigns to attract more customers. In 2008, the figure soared to 25.72 million and it is esti

Sep 5, 2011By Kang Seung-woo

Kang Seung-woo

Read more

FSC Chairman warns of eurozone crisis

Korean banks could collapse within 3 months of a crisis

Personal info leaks spook Samsung Card

Greenberg is optimistic salesman

Two thirds of dead cremated

ACE Life pushes limits of opportunity

Financial firms merciless on debtors

Rip-off jean merchants

FSS opposes credit financing

’Sleeper cards’ increase amid economic blues

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