K-Bank Signals Revival Next Month... Increases Capital to 900 Billion Won to Resume New Loans

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[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Hyo-jin] K-Bank, South Korea's first internet-only bank, which has faced operational restrictions due to financial difficulties, is expected to begin full-scale normalization next month.

According to the financial sector on the 21st, K-Bank held a board meeting on the 19th and approved the issuance of 31,470,340 new convertible shares worth 157.4 billion KRW.

Accordingly, new shares will be allocated to each shareholder according to their shareholding ratio on the 8th of next month, and if there are any unsubscribed shares, major shareholders will be able to divide and subscribe to them. The payment date for the capital increase is the 28th of next month.

A capital increase centered on K-Bank's three major shareholders?BC Card, Woori Bank, and NH Investment & Securities?is also expected to proceed next month. Once the capital increase is completed, K-Bank will secure approximately 400 billion KRW, increasing its total capital from about 500 billion KRW to 900 billion KRW.

K-Bank plans to accelerate the normalization of operations by leveraging the capital increase to introduce new products such as new unsecured loans and non-face-to-face apartment mortgage loans.

K-Bank posted losses of 79.7 billion KRW in 2018 and 100.8 billion KRW last year. Since April last year, it has sequentially and temporarily suspended the sale of new loan products.

Although full operations are not possible, the cumulative number of customers, which was 620,000 at the end of 2017, increased to 860,000 in 2018 and 1.2 million last year, indicating that the foundation for revival has been somewhat established.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.