By Kim Jae-kyoung
Staff reporter
Mirae Asset Securities ranked top in investment returns in equity proprietary trading among the nation's top 10 brokerage houses in 2009. The 10 firms are Mirae, Hyundai, Samsung, Shinhan, Korea, Daewoo, Daishin, Tongyang, Woori and Hana.
Equity proprietary trading refers to securities firms' stock trading for direct gain instead of commission income. In other words they trade stocks with their own money as opposed to customers' money, so as to make a return for themselves.
According to the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) Monday, the 10 companies' average return on the equity investment reached 34.8 percent during the 2009 fiscal year, which ended in March.
The outcome was a huge improvement from the previous year when the figure was in negative territory but it was still below the benchmark KOSPI's growth rate of 40.33 percent. In 2009, the 10 firms invested a total of 2.56 trillion won in equity proprietary trading, compared to the previous year's 1.85 trillion won.
By company, Mirae Asset Securities enjoyed the highest return of 55.46 percent last year as it gained 142.7 billion won from the 255.3 billion won investment. Mirae Asset Securities posted a net profit of 169.5 billion won in 2009 with the total sales of 1.8 trillion won, leading its parent Mirae Asset Group's outstanding performance. With 26 subsidiaries, the financial group enjoyed the record net income of 585.3 billion won in 2009, with revenue of 5.2 trillion won.
Hyundai Securities ranked second with 45.66 percent in returns on equity investment, followed by Samsung Securities with 45.42 percent. The other seven brokerage houses saw their returns stay below the KOSPI growth rate.
Shinhan Investment Corp. came fourth with 39.68 percent, followed by Korea Investment & Securities with 39.11 percent, Daewoo Securities with 29.72 percent and Daishin Securities with 25.4 percent. Hana Daetoo Securities ranked bottom with the worst return of 10.77 percent.
In the meantime, according to FnGuide, a local corporate information provider, Korean securities firms have suffered a sharp fall in net profit in the first quarter of this year.
The combined net income for the seven major players ― Woori, Daewoo, Hyundai, Tongyang, Samsung, Mirae Asset and Kiwoom ― is expected to reach 358.1 billion won between April and June, down 33 percent or 119.8 billion won from the previous year's 477.9 billion won.