Bank of Korea keeps interest rates at 2.75%

No rate cut as domestic demand still anemic.

BBVA notes in its Asia Daily Flash report that the Bank of Korea (BOK) left interest rates unchanged at 2.75% at its recent meeting, as expected, six days ahead of the Presidential Election on December 19th. The BOK has cut rates twice this year for a combined 50 bps, the last time in October.

"Looking forward, we expect the BOK to remain on hold in the coming months," said BBVA.

BBVA points out that in the BOK statement the central bank described the economy as still weak primarily due to sluggish domestic demand, and that the negative output gap is unlikely to close soon, while "inflation will remain low for the time being".

On the other hand, the BOK mentions the favorable trends in exports and employment. The BOK also cites the appreciation in the won –which has strengthened by more than 8% against the USD in 2012, the top performing currency in Asia– and ends the statement saying that they will "closely monitor external risk factors and the consequent changes in financial and economic conditions" in order to conduct monetary policy.

Reaching the people who run Asia's businesses is harder than it used to be.

Inboxes are crowded. Attention is short. The executives you most want to reach — the founders, CFOs, and operators who actually move budgets — are the hardest to find through the usual channels. If you're building a company, a category, or a reputation, you already know this.

We've spent twenty years building the room they read. Singapore Business Review is where senior decision makers in Singapore and across Southeast Asia come for business coverage they can't get elsewhere — in print, online, and in person at the summits and roundtables we host across seven markets.

If you have something these readers should know about — a point of view worth publishing, a product worth their attention, an event worth their time — we'd like to hear what you're trying to do.

Book a meeting

| Or download the media kit (PDF)

240,000 senior readers quarterly in print Top 1,700 Singapore companies reached

7 markets across Southeast Asia