S.Korea's foreign debt rises to 485.8 bln USD in Q1

Source: Xinhua | 2020-05-22

South Korea's foreign debt rose in the first quarter as banks secured foreign liquidity on worry about an economic fallout from the COVID-19 outbreak across the world, central bank data showed Thursday.

Foreign debt totaled 485.8 billion U.S. dollars as of the end of March, up 18.8 billion dollars from three months ago, according to the Bank of Korea (BOK).

Short-term debt increased 14 billion dollars to 148.5 billion dollars, while long-term external liability grew 4.8 billion dollars to 337.3 billion dollars in the first quarter.

Banks secured foreign currency liquidity to prepare for the financial market volatility caused by the COVID-19 spread across the globe.

The ratio of short-term foreign debt to foreign currency reserves stood at 37.1 percent as of the end of March, up 4.2 percentage points from three months earlier. It was the highest in seven years.

The ratio of short-term foreign debt to the total external liability rose 1.8 percentage points to 30.6 percent in the cited period.