Does Korea benefit from FTA with EU?

First published in The Korea Herald.


 July 1 marked the fourth anniversary of the EU-Korea free trade agreement, which entered into force in 2011. It was touted as the first of a new generation of FTAs, going further than any previous agreements in lifting trade barriers. Being also the EU’s first trade deal with an Asian country, Korea was expected to benefit immensely.
The agreement eliminated duties for industrial and agricultural goods in a progressive, step-by-step approach. The majority of import duties were removed already when the FTA entered into force. On July 1, 2016, import duties will be eliminated on all products except for a limited number of agricultural products.
In addition to eliminating duties on nearly all trade in goods, the FTA addresses nontariff barriers to trade with a specific focus on the automotive, pharmaceuticals, medical devices and electronics sectors.
It also creates new opportunities for market access in services and investments, and includes provisions in areas such as competition policy, government procurement, intellectual property rights, transparency in regulation and sustainable development.
All this has definitely had an impact on EU-Korea economic relations, with bilateral trade growing immensely. More European goods are now more visible in stores and many European companies have entered the market. In fact, the EU was the largest investor last year, injecting a total of $6.5 billion, followed by the United States ($3.6 billion), Singapore ($1.7 billion) and China ($1.2 billion).
This would seem to indicate that the deal is a tremendous success. But is it?

Looking back

The Korea-EU FTA reflects the larger trade strategies both sides have pursued from the beginning of the 21st century.

Prior to the mid-2000s, both were reluctant to enter into bilateral FTAs, preferring to conduct trade through the World Trade Organization and through regional preferential trade arrangements. However, they changed track and have been pursuing FTAs aggressively since.

The EU was a pioneer in negotiating preferential trade arrangements and used it to anchor trade relations with neighboring countries, such as members of the European Free Trade Area and as a transition mechanism in trade relations with countries slated to accede to the EU. The EU also employed PTAs to preserve preferential trade relationships with former colonies among developing countries.
The FTA with Korea was part of a new wave of EU FTAs and part of an overall strategy referred to as Global Europe that the European Commission announced in 2006. The strategy was developed to respond to the challenges faced by EU members in a rapidly globalizing economy. An objective of that strategy was to work towards reducing tariff and nontariff barriers in trade and to liberalize markets for foreign investment.
As part of the Global Europe strategy, the EU has engaged in FTA negotiations with the objective that the FTAs are more appropriate vehicles to address more trade complex issues and can serve as building blocks toward a more robust multilateral trading system.
The Global Europe strategy sets down two main criteria for selecting FTA partners: (1) that the partner country offers sufficient market potential and (2) a sufficient level of growth opportunities that would result from the removal of tariff and nontariff barriers as a result of the FTA. Based on these criteria, along with the fact that Korea had negotiated an agreement with the United States, the European Commission identified South Korea as a priority country for an FTA.
As for Korea, for nearly a decade, it was transforming itself into an FTA hub in Northeast Asia. Signing a network of FTAs was a key part of the national economic strategy of President Lee Myung-bak as well as his predecessor Roh Moo-hyun. Both presented FTAs as necessary for advancing Korea’s economic well-being.
Ongoing competitive pressure from Japanese firms, increased competition from Chinese enterprises and the rapid aging of the Korean workforce heightened the sense of urgency to boost national competitiveness.
President Lee set a goal of building a “free trade network” that by 2014 would enable over 70 percent of Korean exports to enjoy duty-free access. He explicitly tried to diversify the composition of Korea’s FTA partners, simultaneously negotiating FTAs with large advanced economies as well as with natural resource-rich developing countries.
The Korea-EU FTA also fit into his goal of creating the “Global Korea” by expanding Korea’s engagement with and presence in the international community.
As a result, negotiations were launched in 2007, and after more than two years of negotiations, both sides finally signed an agreement on October 6, 2010. Both the Korean National Assembly and the EU Parliament have ratified the agreement, and it went into effect on July 1, 2011.
In 2009, the year preceding the official signing of the deal, Korea accounted for 2 percent of EU merchandise exports, ranking 12th as an export market, and accounted for 3 percent of EU merchandise imports, ranking ninth as a source of EU imports.
On the other hand, the much larger EU market of 492 million people with a gross domestic product of $14.4 trillion was much more important to Korea. In 2009, the EU was the second-largest market for Korean merchandise exports, with a 13 percent share of total Korean exports, second to China with its 24 percent share.
The EU was the third-largest source of Korean imports in 2009 with a 10 percent share of Korean merchandise imports behind China with a 17 percent share and Japan with a 15 percent share. In contrast, the United States accounted for 10 percent of Korean exports and 9 percent of Korean imports.
Among the EU member countries, Korea’s largest trading partners were and continue to be Germany, France and the United Kingdom.

Plain statistics


In 2010, a year before the implementation of the FTA, bilateral trade amounted to $92.23 billion, with Korea having a trade surplus -- exports stood at $53.51 billion and imports from EU at $38.72 billion. By 2014, bilateral trade showed a growth of 23.65 percent to reach 114.05 billion. However, everything is not so rosy. Korea now has a trade deficit -- exports of 51.66 billion and imports of 62.39 billion.
This clearly indicates that Korean companies have not been able to take advantage of the deal to the same extent as EU companies.
This trend is also acknowledged by the European Commission in its annual report on the trade deal submitted to the European parliament and Council in March.
It noted that the EU’s share in Korea’s total imports from the world increased from 9 percent before the FTA to 11 percent in the third year of the FTA implementation. Over the same period of time, the EU‘s share in total exports from Korea declined from 11 percent to 9 percent.
In terms of EU exports, the most important categories of products were: “Machinery and appliances,” accounting for almost 34 percent of total EU exports to Korea; followed by “transport equipment,” where exports increased by over 56 percent and represent 16 percent of total EU exports to Korea.
“Chemical products”, where exports increased by 9 percent in the third year of FTA implementation, accounting for over 12 percent of total EU exports.
Other categories of products for which EU exports increased significantly since July 2011 are “mineral products,” “wood” and “pearls and precious metals.”
As far as EU imports from Korea are concerned, the main product categories are: “Machinery and appliances” accounting for 36 percent of EU imports from Korea -- they have declined by 20 percent since the FTA took effect; and “Transport equipment” accounting for 26 percent of total EU imports from Korea, showing fluctuating growth.
Significant increases were noted in plastics, mineral and chemical products.
The report also notes that EU exports of motor vehicles to Korea increased by 90 percent, accounting for 9 percent of total EU exports to Korea. On the other hand, EU imports of motor vehicles from Korea grew by 53 percent. Motor vehicles account for 11 percent of total EU imports from Korea.
EU exports of car parts to Korea increased by 6 percent since the 12-month period before the FTA, whereas EU imports from Korea of car parts increased by over 20 percent. Over the three-year period, the respective imports from the rest of the world increased by merely 3 percent.
That is as far as product classification goes, which clearly indicates that Korea’s exports are not really much diversified.
In fact another set of data also shows some disappointing results. If we look at the figures for the first half of the year starting from 2011, something strange can be seen. Bilateral trade between Korea and EU in the first six months of 2015 is actually less than the first half of 2011, before the trade deal was implemented. In 2011, bilateral trade amounted to 53.64 billion, while it registered 51.64 billion this year.
Taking a closer look, we can see that it is Korean exports to the EU that have drastically gone down, while EU imports into Korea have increased.
This is worrisome for Korean companies, which shows that the economic slump has affected them more than their counterparts in the EU. This certainly needs to be investigated by scholars.
In fact, according to a recent survey of 360 major companies in 18 EU member countries by the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency, more than seven out of 10 European companies are taking advantage of the FTA to promote their business opportunities.
The awareness of the Korea-EU FTA among European companies is far higher than that for the EU’s free trade deals with other countries.
Comparable figures were 35 percent for the EU-South Africa FTA, 34.7 percent for the EU-Mexico FTA, and 28.6 percent for the EU-Chile FTA, the survey showed.
About 34 percent of the respondents said they have increased imports of Korean products since the implementation of the bilateral free trade deal.

More efforts needed

Clearly, the Korean government has its task cut out for it to ensure that the effects of the trade deal benefit both sides. At present it appears to be one-sided.
Moreover, Korea’s exports to the EU are concentrated into a few sectors, such as ships, automobiles and electronics. These three sectors represent almost 60 percent of Korea’s total exports to the EU, in contrast to exports of other countries that are much more diversified. This requires attention.
As noted in a report by the Korea Institute for International Economic Policy, in order to take full advantage of the FTA, it is necessary to not only increase the utilization rate of tariff preferences, but also improve the business environment and productivity and upgrade industrial structures in Korea.
“With more countries committing themselves to comprehensive FTAs with the EU and the U.S. and Korea relocating more of their production bases abroad, it is more likely that exports from domestic production will be replaced by overseas production. As a result, Korea’s relative advantage as an early comer in the FTA is likely to be obsolete. In this context, it is necessary to increase the utilization rate of the FTAs in the short run and to use the FTA as occasions to strengthen industrial competitiveness in the long run,” the KIEP noted.

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Pros and cons of Korea’s minimum wage law

First published in The Korea Herald.

The minimum wage in Korea has been set at 6,030 won ($5.30) for next year after weeks of debate, although the labor unions boycotted the government-led talks on the final day.
Labor union representatives walked out of a meeting of the Minimum Wage Council ― a trilateral committee of employers, employees and labor market experts to set the minimum wage through discussion ― on Wednesday. They were upset with the suggestion that there should be a cap on the increase in the minimum wage. However, the council went ahead and finalized an increase on the following day.

The Minimum Wage Act stipulates that at least one-third of all representatives on the council can decide on the rate if any party refuses to attend the negotiations more than once.
The new rate will be notified by the government on Aug. 5 after taking into consideration all objections to the finalized rate.
In Korea, the minimum wage is the lowest allowable gross wage per hour, regardless of employment status or nationality. There are some exceptions to this rule: Businesses that only employ family members or relatives living in the same residence; domestic service users; and seamen who are governed by the seamen act.
The unions initially demanded a 79 percent rise from the current minimum hourly wage of 5,580 won to 10,000 won, while employers ― represented by the Korea Employers Federation ― were pushing for a freeze. The unions lowered their demand to 8,100 won, and refused to budge from this stance, despite opposition from others on the council.
The minimum wage in Korea was raised by 7.1 percent this year from 5,210 won in 2014 ― it was 600 won in 1989 when the government formed the wage council. The latest hike, therefore, marks an 8.1 percent hike.
For comparison purposes, the minimum wage in the United States is $7.50, Japan $6.40 and the U.K. $10.
The KEF argues that the minimum wage has risen too rapidly and needs to be stabilized, voicing concerns over possible job losses and soaring production costs. On the other hand, the unions maintain that a hike would curb the nation’s income inequality and boost consumer spending.
So, who among them is right?
At face value, the logic of the unions seems right, as minimum wages protect workers from exploitation by employers and reduce poverty. Legal minimum wages are a government’s most direct policy lever for influencing wage levels, especially for workers with a weak bargaining position.
They also serve as a basic labor standard, alongside working-hours regulations and related provisions to ensure basic job-quality standards. And supporting low-wage earners is widely seen as important for promoting inclusive growth.
However, many economists do not think so. They believe that minimum wage laws cause unnecessary hardship for the very people they are supposed to help.

The argument is that while the law can set wages, it cannot guarantee jobs. The experience in most countries with a minimum wage law is that low-skilled workers are often priced out of the labor market. This is because employers typically are not willing to pay a worker more than the value of the additional product that he or she produces.
In fact, there are numerous studies using aggregate time-series data from a variety of countries that have found that minimum wage laws reduce employment.
If employers consider the wage floor too high, Workers whose productivity is valued less than the mandated wage will find jobs only in occupations not covered by the law or with employers willing to break it.
In Korea, we already have seen many highly publicized cases in recent months where nonregular and part-time workers were paid below the mandated wages until a public outcry made them reconsider.
In addition to making jobs hard to find, minimum wage laws may also harm workers by changing how they are compensated by cutting fringe benefits which are an important part of the total compensation package for many low-wage workers.
Studies have also found that the minimum wage increases generally redistribute income among low-income families rather than moving it from those with high incomes to those with low incomes.
As the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has noted in a recent policy brief, minimum wages are common but controversial. Currently, 26 out of 34 OECD countries have statutory minimum wages.
“Views differ about whether such support is best provided through minimum wages, or closely related policies, such as government transfers,” it noted.
In recent years, policymakers in many countries have adjusted minimum wages in the context of high and increasingly persistent unemployment, stagnant or even declining average wages and, frequently, falling incomes especially among the poorest families.
“While minimum wages are intended to support low-wage workers, the cost of employing them can be at the heart of concerns that legal minimum might reduce employment, or damage the international competitiveness of domestic firms relying on low-skilled labor,” the brief noted
Further, tax burdens too have to be taken into account.

Even at the very bottom of the wage ladder, taxes and social levies can strongly reduce take-home pay. At the same time, taxes and other mandatory nonwage labor costs also push up the cost of employing minimum-wage workers.
By having an impact on labor costs and workers’ take-home pay, the overall tax burden has implications for how well minimum wages perform at supporting low-wage workers, while avoiding significant job losses.
Given the overwhelming evidence in numerous economic studies, the Korean trade unions should have softened their stringent position and worked out an increase to their satisfaction. By boycotting the talks, they did not do justice to young people and low-skilled workers.
While it is impractical to do away with the minimum wage, given the social realities in Korea, the government should also step in and ease the concerns of businesses.
Some countries have adopted specific measures to reduce the gap between the amounts an employer pays and the take-home pay that the worker receives. To lower employers’ costs, or to reduce risks of employment losses following minimum hikes, some have introduced tax rebates for firms employing minimum wage workers ― something the Korean government should consider.
More importantly, there needs to be efficient coordination between minimum wage policies and other redistribution measures by the government, notably taxes and transfers ― that are lacking in Korea.
These small steps could go a long way in protecting the interests of businesses as well as ordinary workers, given that the economy is struggling to recover and unemployment continues to be a major concern.

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Impact of ARFP on Korea’s financial services

First published in The Korea Herald.


A very important development in the first week of June that will bring huge benefits to the financial services industry in Korea has gone largely unnoticed here.

Finance officials and regulators from six Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation members, including Korea, who are leading the development of the Asia Region Fund Passport concluded a week of meetings in Singapore to iron out the details of the proposal and announced that it was on track to be launched in 2016.

The countries ― also including Australia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand ― aim to cut down on incompatible or overlapping financial regulations that may hinder the marketing of managed funds between participating economies.

Six other APEC members ― Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam ― are also closely following the discussions on the rules and arrangements, hoping to join the initiative.

So what exactly is the ARFP, and why is it important?

Two years ago, finance ministers from Australia, Korea, New Zealand and Singapore signed a statement of intent on the establishment of the ARFP. Accordingly, it aims to “facilitate the growth and competitiveness of financial markets in the region and the fund management industry, creating a common framework that has the effect of reducing regulatory inconsistency and overlap faced by collective investment scheme operators seeking to offer collective investment schemes in multiple economies.”

Once it is established, fund managers in a participating economy will be able to offer a single product across multiple markets, which will result in a larger client base that will grow the fund size sufficiently to realize economies of scale.

At the same time, more competition, a higher number of funds and funds under management will help keep the fund sizes at an optimal level so as not to erode fund performance. Investors will also benefit from improved efficiency as direct access to offshore funds results in the elimination of an extra layer of fees and commissions charged by local operators.

According to the APEC Policy Support Unit, once the ARFP is fully up and running, it could save the region’s investors $20 billion annually in fund management costs, offer higher investment returns at the same or lower degrees of risk and encourage the establishment of locally domiciled funds that could create 170,000 jobs within five years.

In its study of the potential costs and benefits, the APEC unit said that following the introduction of the ARFP, using a conservative assumption of 20 percent increase per annum in assets under management over 5 years, almost all the involved Asian funds markets would achieve better efficiency.

Currently investors in some Asian economies have limited products available to them. This is due partly to strict regulations in those economies that have discouraged fund managers from distributing foreign funds in local markets. Without a broad range of foreign products to choose from, investors have to place the bulk of their funds in local products.

International portfolio diversification can facilitate the possibility of reducing risks only if values of cross-market correlations of returns are low. The benefits of a more optimal portfolio can be transferred to investors in the form of better returns for risks.

The ARFP can also bring significant benefits to the wider regional and global economies by supporting the recycling of savings toward productive investments that are critical for the region’s growth.

The benefits can also extend beyond financing investment needs. The ARFP can introduce to local funds industries foreign technical know-how, competitive pricing and higher standards of disclosure and performance. These promote efficiencies in the local fund industries, resulting in greater global competitiveness of the Asian funds management industry, the APEC unit has noted.

One of the measurable contributions of the ARFP to the economy is the potential increase in employment numbers in the funds industries in Asia. An essential feature of the ARFP is that it will increase the demand for funds to be domiciled in Asia. This would offer increased job opportunities, not only to manage the funds but also to service the fund structure.

What does it mean for the asset management industry in Korea?

Korea has a mature funds management industry. The first contractual-type equity investment scheme was introduced in 1970, after the promulgation of the Securities Investment Trust Business Act in 1969. The development of the funds industry experienced a setback during the Asian financial crisis in 1997-98. However, it has since quickly recovered.

Assets under management ― the sum of fund assets and assets under discretionary management ― by the 86 asset management companies totaled 685 trillion won ($616 billion) at the end of 2014, up 9.1 percent or 57 trillion won from 628 trillion won a year earlier. Fund assets increased 14 percent to 382 trillion won. Publicly offered funds increased 7.4 percent to 204 trillion won, while private equity funds increased 22.8 percent to 178 trillion won. Discretionary assets increased 3.4 percent to 303 trillion won during the same period.

The aggregate net income of the asset management companies for 2014 came to 424.8 billion won, up 14.1 percent from 372.4 billion won during the last year. A total of 20 companies reported net losses for the period.

However, despite its success, the funds industry is fragmented and markedly skewed toward equity that dominates the total funds’ AUM.

While regulators in Korea have been keen to pursue market liberalization, the industry still faces challenges. For instance, industry analysts have noted that the sale of offshore funds is facing tight regulatory hurdles, including preferential tax treatment for onshore versus offshore funds. As a result, the presence of foreign funds in Korea has been relatively weak.

The ARFP is a therefore a very good initiative to give a boost to the industry in Korea.

However, the Financial Supervisory Service should also keep in mind the risks that are involved with the creation of the ARFP.

As in any cross-border financing solution, shocks in one market can be amplified and transmitted to other markets very quickly. This can become worse given the enhanced interconnectedness and efficiencies of the transmission and intermediation process currently available.

While the deepening integration of financial markets will help promote the financing of investment, care should be taken to see that they do not accentuate the risks associated with large and volatile capital flows.

The FSS should ensure that Korea’s regulations and market practices are upgraded and harmonized in tune with regional standards. It should also keep investor protection foremost in mind, minimizing systemic vulnerabilities and maximizing market transparency before finalizing the plans to rollout the ARFP.

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Stock price limits and circuit breakers

First Published in The Korea Herald.

Starting next month, the Korea Exchange will expand price limits and introduce market-wide circuit breakers that should provide some relief for stock traders and retail investors.

Price limits and circuit breakers are used by many stock exchanges and regulators to counter severe price movements in financial markets, and Korea is no exception. Price limits are maximum percentages or values that a security or derivative contract can rise or fall in a trading day. Circuit breakers are trading halts triggered by sharp price movements, and can be imposed on either an individual financial instrument or the market as a whole. They were first adopted by the New York Stock Exchange and other U.S. exchanges in 1988.

Circuit breakers had been recommended by the U.S. Presidential Task Force in the aftermath of the stock market crash on Oct. 19, 1987, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 508 points, or 22.7 percent. These circuit breakers were not triggered until a decade later, on Oct. 27, 1997.

Korea’s bourse operator has announced that, starting June, the price limit is set to rise to 30 percent, while the circuit breaker would halt trading for 20 minutes if the benchmark index falls 8 percent and 15 percent and shut down the daily session if the index plunges more than 20 percent.

Currently, stocks listed on the main KOSPI and tech-heavy KOSDAQ markets are allowed to move within a 15 percent price range from the previous session’s closing price. It is the first time in 17 years that the daily price cap is being revised. The existing circuit breaker allows the bourse operator to suspend trading for 20 minutes once a day if the market cap falls by 10 percent and is not triggered after 2:20 p.m.

“Although the current price limit system has contributed to stabilizing the stock market, it has hampered effective price setting by preventing the latest information from being immediately reflected in share prices,” officials of KRX were quoted as saying by the media.

It is hoped that the expanded price range will help the market better set the appropriate price in accordance with corporate values, he noted.

There is no doubt that a fair and orderly trading environment is key to maintaining a vibrant and well-functioning securities market.

Market interventions are aimed at preventing potential market disorder and restoring order in a trading environment that may be under stress. By providing a break or limit in trading, interventions are intended to provide the opportunity for information to be disseminated widely and equally, for market participants to reconsider their trading decisions rationally in light of new information and to serve as a signal of potential order imbalances in the system.

However, there is no consensus on whether price limits and circuit breakers are effective tools during crises. To date, there is still no convincing evidence of their potency.

Let us take a brief look at the two different schools of thought on the validity of these market invention systems.

As noted earlier, supporters say the systems provide investors with a cooling-off period to calm fears or provide time to digest news when there are steep declines in the markets; reduce market volatility and protect investors from excessive market volatility; provide time to restore the equilibrium between buyers and sellers; and provide the opportunity for increased information flow.

Those against market intervention, however, argue that they prevent investors from engaging in equity transactions that reflect their assessments of economic events, trapping investors in their positions. They find the tools counterproductive as they drain liquidity and diminish market depth.

The tools accelerate price movements toward the pre-announced limits as market participants alter their strategies and trade in anticipation of a market halt. In addition, they induce panic and uncertainty if the markets shut down suddenly and scare away the buying power necessary to turn a selling panic around.

The other arguments are that they are unfair to market participants with positions that benefit from volatility and deprive market participants of opportunities to raise liquidity to meet other obligations and lead to a chain of defaults.

In essence, price limits and circuit breakers deprive market participants of the opportunities to transfer risk and interrupt the price discovery process, two key market functions.

Economists have pointed out that one way to tackle this is to have the right of a discretionary halt built into the regulatory system, but use it rarely or sparingly as a deterrent. Such a deterrent would be just that ― a deterrent.

This is because, without a breaker, the price is continuously available as a barometer for investor beliefs. However, with a breaker in place, the price simply ceases to be displayed. This causes uncertainty among market participants as to what the asset is truly worth. The execution price uncertainty can also lead to misallocation of resources and the bearing of unwanted and avoidable risk.

Another alternative to such halts are “sidecars,” which have been used in the U.S. exchanges. Market orders are batched over short intervals and then matched against limit-order books, and move from a continuous auction to batch orders during extreme market moves, which would potentially slow trading down and calm markets. These procedures do not cause total cessation of trade and price discovery.

In any case, the market intervention mechanisms have been in used in many advanced countries, and one does not expect the Korean regulators to ditch the automatic system to shield the market from volatility.

It is good to know that the KRX will adopt a wider range of measures to prevent excessive market fluctuation and step up market monitoring in the first month to detect any suspicious trading activities. It is also preparing changes in the electronic trading system in cooperation with brokerage houses to introduce new functions to curb excessive stock fluctuations.

Given that, since the rules are being eased, it is absolutely necessary that the bourse operator strictly monitors trading, not just for one month, but continuously. The regulator cannot afford to let its guard down.

The stock market is an important barometer of the aggregate economy. A growing stock market signals to policymakers that sentiment is positive and investors expect economic conditions to improve. Appropriate policy action can then be taken. In a similar vein, a falling stock market signals that market participants expect bleak economic conditions. Policymakers may then take action to stimulate growth and perhaps contain inflation.

Therefore, it is very important for the stock market to function efficiently without any hiccups and the regulator should make all efforts to ensure it.

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