S. Korea's biz failures hit near 4-year high in Dec.

SEOUL, Jan. 19 (Yonhap) -- South Korea's corporate bankruptcies hit a near four-year high in December as more companies were hurt by the slumping economy and tightening credit conditions, the central bank said Monday.

The number of business failures came to 345 in December, up 48 from the previous
month, according to the Bank of Korea (BOK). The December figure marked the
highest monthly growth since March 2005 when the number reached 359, it added.
The number of start-ups, meanwhile, rose by 466 to 3,797 in December. The ratio
of start-ups to business failures reached 16.4 last month, compared with 16.2
percent in the previous month when the ratio hit a near four-year low, the BOK
said.
The default rate of corporate bills -- bonds, checks and promissory notes -- rose
to 0.04 percent last month, up 0.01 percentage point from November.
The South Korean economy grew 0.5 percent in the third quarter from three months
earlier, the slowest growth in four years, as exports lost ground amid weakening
domestic demand. Amid the global economic downturn, Korea's economic growth is
widely expected to dip into the 1-percent range this year on plunging exports,
economists say.
sooyeon@yna.co.kr
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