NPS CIO Seo Won-joo

Mergers & Acquisitions Soon for sale: Altos Ventures-backed Cafe Knotted operator

Silicon Valley-based Altos Ventures-backed Good Food For Good (GFFG), operator of South Korea’s popular dessert cafe, Cafe Knotted, will likel...

Pension funds NPS yet to schedule external manager selection; PE firms’ fundraising woes deepen

South Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS), the world’s third-largest pension fund, has yet to decide on a plan to select local extern...

Shipping & Shipbuilding HD KSOE secures $1.8 bn in container ship orders

HD Korea Shipbuilding & Offshore Engineering Co. (KSOE) secured orders for 22 container ships worth a total of 2.54 trillion won ($1.8 billion) ...

Asset management Mirae Asset bets on China as Korean investors’ US focus draws concern

South Korea’s leading asset manager Mirae Asset Financial Group is increasingly unveiling China-focused investment products as Chairman P...

Markets Kakao shares sink on SK Telecom’s stake sell-off news

Kakao Corp. shares underperformed its peers and the broad market on Friday after SK Telecom Co. sold off its entire stake in the South Korean platfo...

Earnings KB Financial logs 61% profit growth, rebounding from ELS fiasco

KB Financial Group Inc. on Thursday reported a 61% jump in first-quarter profit, led by a nearly threefold rise in earnings at its flagship unit Koo...

Steel POSCO to invest in Hyundai Steel’s Louisiana plant

South Korea’s top steel maker POSCO has decided to invest in Hyundai Steel Co.'s first overseas plant in Louisiana and collaborate on research...

Korean stock market NPS pours $3.9 bn to buttress Korean stock market

South Korea’s National Pension Service, the country’s largest institutional investor, has come to the rescue of the domestic stock marke...

Pension funds NPS gears up for investment overhaul with boost in risk assets

South Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS), the country’s largest institutional investor, is set to overhaul its investment strategy w...

Private equity Glenwood PE to increase blind fund to $1 bn on pension funds’ interest

South Korea’s Glenwood Private Equity Co. is set to increase a blind fund to 1.5 trillion won ($1 billion) as pension funds at home and abroad...

Sovereign wealth funds Korea’s WGBI inclusion moved to next April; Seoul works on policy steps

South Korea’s much-anticipated inclusion of its bonds in the FTSE World Government Bond Index (WGBI) has been postponed to April 2026 from Nov...

Korean stock market South Korean stocks, currency dive amid deeper US tariff turmoil

The South Korean stock market logged its biggest daily loss of more than 5% in eight months on Monday, joining its Asian peers bruised by panic sell...

Entertainment Kakao Entertainment sheds loss-making units, revives IPO prospects

Kakao Entertainment Corp. has been divesting unprofitable music labels and digital content platforms, which it has gobbled up over the past few year...

Real estate Asia Property to buy WeWork building in Seoul

Seoul-based real estate investment firm Asia Property has been picked as the sole preferred bidder for an office building currently occupied by cowo...

Pension funds S.Korea’s NPS to double pension fund size by 2050, hike risky assets

South Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS) is projected to nearly double its fund size to 3,500 trillion won ($2.38 trillion) by 2050, follo...

Real estate Shinhan REITs picked as sole bidder for BNK Digital Tower

Shinhan REITs Management is expected to acquire BNK Digital Tower, an office building in the affluent neighborhood of Gangnam in southern Seoul, aft...

Batteries SK On to supply 100 GWh of EV batteries to Nissan

SK On Co. has landed a deal to supply nearly 100 gigawatt hours (GWh) of electric vehicle batteries to Japanese carmaker Nissan Motor Co., which cou...

Pension funds Korea’s pension fund NPS rules out investing in MBK’s hostile M&A deals

South Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS) said on Monday it will not participate in investments related to hostile mergers and acquisitions...

Games Krafton invests in 10 overseas game startups in 2024

Krafton Inc. invested in 10 overseas game developers in 2024 in search of the next big franchise intellectual property (IP) following its mega-hit t...

Pension funds NPS to buy stake in Australia’s Metrics to expand alternative investments

South Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS), the world’s third-largest pension fund, has agreed to buy a stake in Australian asset mana...

Debt financing MBK chairman to leverage own funds to pay Homeplus suppliers

Michael ByungJu Kim, the co-founder, partner and chairman of Northeast Asia-focused private equity firm (PEF) MBK Partners Ltd., is expected to leve...

Pension funds KB, Samsung SRA, Capstone named NPS’ core property fund operators

South Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS) has selected three asset managers to oversee its domestic core real estate platform fund — ...

Pension funds NPS to mull responsible investment system for alternative investments

South Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS), the world’s third-largest pension fund, is poised to consider expanding its responsible in...

Pension funds S.Korea’s pension fund NPS to overhaul alternative investment strategy

The National Pension Service (NPS), South Korea’s state-run pension fund and the country’s largest institutional investor, plans to intr...

Pension funds South Korea’s pension fund NPS risks massive loss from Homeplus fiasco

South Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS), the nation’s biggest institutional investor, could lose more than 1 trillion won ($692 mil...

Foreign exchange South Korea’s forex reserves dip to nearly 5-year low in February

South Korea’s foreign exchange reserves diminished to the lowest level in nearly five years last month, largely due to the expanded forex swap...

Real estate Kumho Petrochemical's Seoul headquarters put on market

IGIS Asset Management Co., has put Kumho Petrochemical Group’s headquarters building, Signature Tower in central Seoul, up for sale – a ...

Pension funds S.Korea’s pension fund NPS posts record return in 2024 on US stock rally

The National Pension Service (NPS), South Korea’s state-run pension fund and the country’s largest institutional investor, said on ...

Travel & Leisure J-R AMC, BlueCove bid on $70 million sale of Mirae Asset, NPS’ Shilla Stay

The sale of Shilla Stay Dongtan, a premium business hotel operated by South Korea’s Hotel Shilla Co., has attracted four bidders, underscoring...

Korean games Nexon becomes 1st Korean game publisher with over 4 trillion won in sales

Nexon Co., the parent of Nexon Games Co., became the first Korean game developer to achieve the 4 trillion won ($2.8 billion) sales milestone in 202...