Top 10 Reasons We Can’t Wait to Close 2009: A gloomy look at the past 12 months in the Korea Times http://bit.ly/7kctSh. 6:44 PM Dec 22nd from bit.ly. The reasons include Poor industrial relations at Ssangyong Motor Disgraceful behaviour in the National Assembly Too many suicides Threats to Jongmyo’s UNESCO status [Read More]
Category: Business & economy (page 9)
Day trading in Derivatives, ajumma-style
South Korea boasts the world’s largest market for equity derivatives by number of contracts traded, with 2.7bn stock index options contracts traded in 2008, according to the World Federation of Exchanges. This compares with 514m traded on Eurex, the next biggest market on that measure. Private traders, encouraged by high leverage gains and low trading … [Read More]
North Korean jeans on sale in Sweden
North Korean jeans on sale in Sweden. A snip at $215! The brand name? “NoKo”. # http://nokojeans.com/ After being turned down by North Korea’s largest textile company, the group managed to secure a manufacturing deal with its largest mining company, Trade 4, which also happens to run a small textile operations on its site. Source: … [Read More]
KIKOs are enforceable after all
Invest Korea Journal: Knock-in, Knock-out (KIKO) contracts may be enforceable after all, but normal suitability principles apply: http://bit.ly/zLXq3p # [Read More]
North Korean labourers in Russia
North Koreans labouring in Russia's timber camps: the UK connection, on Newsnight tonight: http://bit.ly/3wAaFJ # The full video can now be viewed here http://bit.ly/s6YvM # Note the Hwang Byung-ki soundtrack. And another BBC report from Vladivostok, ten years later [Read More]
Choi Jin-shil “failed to maintain dignity”
The late Choi Jin-shil, domestic violence and her advertising contract: The top court ruled that she caused damage to the [construction] company by “failing to keep her social and moral honor” and thus depreciating the brand image. Following Choi’s suicide last October, her two children ― one preschooler and the other primary schooler ― are … [Read More]
Why is the British media so “negative”?
A recent article in the Chosun Ilbo, Why is the British Media Most Critical of Korean Markets? (3 March) asked why British news organisations are so negative: Following the global financial crisis last year, most of the foreign media reports that shook the Korean economy were from British news organizations. Seven out of 10 foreign … [Read More]
LKL 2008 Quiz of the year – the answers
The answers to the teasers posed just before the New Year. 1 Stressful times What does the current credit crunch and the most recent DPRK nuclear test have in common? a) the media blame them on an incompetent government who should have seen it coming and somehow prevented it b) they would both cause a … [Read More]
Kaesong: ancient book-keepers, modern traders
It was a very tantalising lecture. Dr Lewis and his co-authors had been given jpeg images of 18th-century accounting records from Kaesong by a shadowy intermediary. The agent hoped that having seen some quality goods, representing a very small portion of a set of books and records, the academics would fork out hard cash for … [Read More]
Capitalism in old Kaesong
As the North threatens to take steps to shut down its capitalist venture with the South in the Kaesong industrial complex, there’s a timely historical seminar at SOAS this Friday, 28 November. Oxford’s Dr James B Lewis looks at evidence of pre-modern capitalism in old Kaesong. The official title of the seminar: “Korean merchant double-entry … [Read More]
A week is a long time in … Korean economics
By Peter Corbishley Given the present economic world order, last week was an opportune time for an update on Korean peninsular economics. First Aidan Foster Carter tells BAKS that in August President Lee Myung-bak’s military banned “Bad Samaritans,” by Chang Ha-joon, an economics professor at the University of Cambridge, for being un-Korean. Then on the … [Read More]
Developed Market status and other recent business stories
In a week when the most developed market in the world has not particularly covered itself in glory, after years in the waiting room it was announced this week that Korea would be admitted into the FTSE club of developed markets. According to the FT (South Korea wins developed-country status, 18 Sept 2008), this could … [Read More]
The financial sector as engine for growth
There was no hope of applying the Chatham House rule at yesterday’s talk by HE Dr Jun Kwang-woo, chairman of Korea’s Financial Services Commission. With two TV cameras and numerous digital recorders on show, this meeting was firmly on the record. Reflecting the more formal nature of this meeting, Dr Jun spoke from a prepared … [Read More]
Top banking watchdog in town. You too can quiz him
Dr Jun Kwang Woo, the Chairman of the Korean Financial Services Commission, is in Paris and London this week for a range of meetings, including the UK finance minister and the FSA. He will also be speaking to the Korea Discussion Group at Chatham House on Friday afternoon at 4pm. His subject is Korea’s responses … [Read More]
Mad Cows: President Lee’s apology
The following is the full text of President Lee Myung-bak’s statement in a live TV broadcast at Cheong Wa Dae on 22 May to address the resumption of U.S. beef imports and ratification of the Korea-U.S. FTA. Courtesy of the Korean Culture and Information Service (KOIS). For those who haven’t been following the Mad Cow … [Read More]
Koreans in New Zealand
I had known for a while that New Zealand is a place where Koreans have been travelling – and settling down – for a number of years. At the BFI London Film Festival in 2004 there was a short film entitled Eating Sausage (Zia Mandviwalla, 2004), about Korean immigrants in Auckland; while Bungee Jumping of … [Read More]