Why Korean won remains weak despite trade deal with US
A long-awaited tariff deal between Korea and the U.S. provided only brief support for the won, which continued to weaken amid persistent capital outflows and global currency pressures, analysts said Sunday. Under the agreement reached Wednesday, the two nations will restructure a $350 billion trade and investment package — a condition for cutting blanket tariffs from 25 percent to 15 percent — into $200 billion in cash investments, capped at $20 billion annually, and $150 billion for shipbuilding cooperation. The won briefly strengthened following the announcement but later reversed course, trading between 1,420 and 1,430 won per dollar and testing the upper bound of that range. The exchange rate broke the 1,400 level in late September, after hovering in the upper 1,300s through June, and has been climbing steadily since. In the Seoul foreign exchange market on Friday, the won-dollar exchange rate closed at 1,424.4 won per dollar. Despite a strong KOSPI, the won has remained elevated in recent weeks amid uncertainty over the scale and structure of Korea's pledged investments in the U
