April 21, 2024

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South Korea’s nine financial holding firms saw their combined net profit rise 6.8 percent on-year in 2018, helped by a solid gain in interest income, data showed on April 1.

The combined net profit of KB Financial, Shinhan Financial and seven other financial holding companies stood at 11.64 trillion won ($10.28 billion) last year, up from 10.89 trillion won the previous year, according to the data from the Financial Supervisory Service. 

The surge is attributable to strong performances by their bank units, which reported 8.89 trillion won of net profit in 2018. The figure marked a 15.1 percent on-year rise on the back of improved net interest margins.   

The insurance sector, however, fared poorly last year, with combined net profit tumbling 48.8 percent to 511.6 billion won, the data showed.

The holding firms’ total assets came to 2,068 trillion won, up 166.7 trillion won from a year earlier.

As of end-2018, 209 companies were under the wing of the nine financial holding firms -- 10 more from a year earlier -- and they hired 6,592 more workers, bringing the total number to 121,125, the data showed.

By Ram Garikipati and newswires (ram@heraldcorp.com)