Exports Rise Again

The won is weaker in Asia-Pac trade, USD/KRW playing catch up with USD strength from Friday.

• Data earlier showed exports rose 29.5% in the first 20 days of June, imports up 29.1%. The export gains were attributed to robust demand for chips, autos and petroleum products. By sector, outbound shipments of memory chips, a key export item, rose 28.5% on-year, and those of autos jumped 62.2% despite global supply shortages of automotive chips. Exports of petroleum products rose 58.6% on-year as oil prices picked up amid a global economic recovery. But shipments of ships fell 27.7% from a year earlier.
• On the coronavirus front there were 357 new coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours, below 400 for the first time in a week. The healthy ministry unveiled its new social distancing scheme, which allows businesses to stay open longer and permits gatherings of more people from July 1. The move came as the country's vaccination drive is gaining traction.
• Elsewhere Yonhap reported on a Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry poll which showed nearly 8 out of 10 South Korean consumers have increased their online shopping during the coronavirus pandemic.
• There were also reports that state power company KEPCO had decided to retain the electricity rate in Q3 in a bid to ease the financial burden on local households amid the pandemic and rising inflation.