By Kang Seung-woo
Woori Investment and Securities has played a leading role in the development of the Korean capital market over 40 years and established itself as one of the best affiliates of Woori Financial Group.
And the company is looking to become the best overall investment financial company with efforts to solidify its market leadership in its core business areas.
In order to achieve the vision, Woori, headed by CEO Hwang Sung-ho, is pursuing stable growth through investment banking (IB), trading, and wealth management (WM), coupled with an advanced risk management system.
The investment and securities firm was established in 1969 under the name of Hanbo Securities and renamed as Woori in 2005, when it was merged with LG Investment and Securities.
Woori is strengthening efforts to steadily improve IB by shoring up the competitiveness of traditional underwriting risk and nurturing advisory services on merger and acquisition (M&A) and corporate restructuring, private equity fund (PEF) and principal investment (PI).
While driving for the strategic targets, Woori plans to step up as deal originator by providing comprehensive financial solutions including public funding through capital markets and establish itself as a global player on cooperation with international IBs that will help to expand Woori’s global network.
As for trading, Woori will strive to boost its capacity for the introduction of fresh products and specialization of management in order to lower earnings volatility, while trying to stabilize profits to secure economies of scale.
In addition, Woori intends to secure a future growth engine, exploring a variety of new businesses including a hedge fund.
The company expects that a series of plans will contribute to Woori growing into the No. 1 trading player that can compete with global IBs shoulder to shoulder.
Woori’s WM business’s main goal is gaining profits through the innovation of business model.
It means that the company will try to expand its customer base, get customers’ share of wallet (SOW) and improve their return of assets (ROA) in its bid to raise profits from retail business. SOW refers to the amount of the customer’s total spending that a business captures in the products and services that it offers.
Meanwhile, under the goal to become a regional player in Asia, Woori is pushing to expand global network by making inroads into key business bases, while cooperating with local players in other areas.
In addition, the firm is set to diversify its business line based in Hong Kong and China and take advantage of network from its affiliates to strengthen business capacity.