Eight out of every 10 export-centered small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) have suffered from the rapid appreciation of the Korean won against the US dollar, according to the Industrial Bank of Korea (IBK).
In its latest survey of 391 local SMEs on the effect of currency appreciation, the state-run bank found that 84.2 per cent of the respondents had a serious bottleneck in management. Of these, 51.3 per cent considered the problem a “very serious” one.
The bank said that 35.2 per cent of those surveyed cited deterioration in profitability as the biggest difficulty, followed by foreign exchange loss (34.1 per cent) and a fall in exports (12.6 per cent).
The respondents suggested 1,115.6 won per dollar as break-even point exchange rates.
