South Korea’s exports fell by more than 10 percent in July, with the rate of decline returning to double digits after single digits in May and June, the trade ministry said Monday.
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July’s result was stronger than the $3.97 billion surplus recorded in June, moving the year-to-date surplus to $28.23 billion.
Imports continued to shrink at a faster clip, falling 14.4 percent on-year to $33.3 billion in July.
It prolonged the period of the monthly export fall to 19 months in a row, the longest in its history.
South Korea is the first major exporting economy to report monthly trade data and is home to global suppliers such as Samsung Electronics, Hyundai Motor and SK Hynix Inc.
Services account balance, which measures the flow of travel, transport costs and royalties, logged a deficit of 1.38 billion dollars in June, up from an 11.4 billion-dollar deficit in May. However, this is a sharp turnaround compared to the same month a year ago, when Korea’s exports inched up 0.6 percent month on month.
Primary income saw a surplus of $1.26 billion thanks to a rise in dividend incomes.
As for financial accounts, there was an outflow of $3.98 billion from domestic investors, compared with the previous month’s $5.07 billion.
Direct investment posted an outflow of 1.48 billion dollars in June, up from 720 million dollars in May as local residents increased outbound investment.
“July exports fell sharply from June due to temporary factors like less working days and fewer ship exports”, said the trade ministry in a statement.
“In the second half, there are different market uncertainties involving the Brexit issue, the direction of monetary policy in advanced countries and the slowdown in China’s economy”, Park said. – China is South Korea’s largest export market, taking about one-quarter of shipments, followed by the United States.
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During the January-June period, trade surplus for goods reached 61 billion dollars, up 3.1 billion dollars from the same period of past year.
