South Korea's overseas direct investment keeps falling in second quarter

SEOUL: South Korea's overseas direct investment kept falling in the second quarter on the back of soft demand for investment in the manufacturing, real estate, information and communications sectors, government data showed Friday.

Overseas investment through the purchase of foreign stocks and the establishment of foreign offices tumbled 13.4% from a year earlier to 14.15 billion US dollars in the April-June quarter after sliding 5.3% in the prior quarter, according to the Ministry of Economy and Finance.

Overseas investment in the manufacturing industry dipped 9.1% to 3.53 billion dollars, with those in the real estate and information and communications industries plunging in double digits to 710 million dollars and 750 million dollars each.

Investment in the finance and insurance sector jumped 18.9% to 6.63 billion dollars in the second quarter.

Direct investment in North America and Asia declined in double figures to 5.54 billion dollars and 3.17 billion dollars, each, but investment in Europe soared 44.4% to 3.11 billion dollars.

By RSS/Xinhua