Fund investments up 36% on year
The amount of money invested in mutual funds in Korea surged 36.1 percent on year in the first 10 months of 2007. Investments in equity funds led the rise amid bullish stock markets at home and abroad, the financial watchdog said yesterday.According to the Financial Supervisory Service, 330.8 trillion won ($361.7 billion) was put in funds as of the end of October, compared with 243 trillion won at the end of last year.
“An 85.6 trillion won surge in equity funds, which invest in local and overseas stock markets, was behind the surge,” the FSS said in a statement.
The popularity of equity funds comes as Korea’s main stock index gained about 40 percent this year.
Amid rallies in foreign stock markets, fund investment overseas tripled to 97.3 trillion won in October from 32.2 trillion won in 2006. Funds investing in the bullish Chinese stock markets totaled 33.6 trillion won, or 48.8 percent of all overseas funds, at the end of October, compared with 9.7 trillion won, or 24 percent of the total in late June.
Meanwhile, the FSS projected that the asset management industry will see stable growth thanks to increasing business from national pension funds and the indirect investment of retirement funds.
As of the end of September, pension funds operated by asset managers totaled 32.5 trillion won, compared with 19.7 trillion won at the end of last year. Retirement funds operated by asset managers were tallied at 237.3 billion won in September, up from 72.9 billion won in 2006.
Yonhap
with the Korea JoongAng Daily
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