South Korea’s exports dropped in January for the first time in 16 months on holidays, although the overseas sales of semiconductors, the country’s top export item, increased on strong demand for high-end products such as artificial intelligence chips, data showed on Saturday.Exports fell 10.3% to $49.1 billion last month from a year earlier, logging the first year-on-year decline since September 2023, according to the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy.“Exports temporarily slowed down in January because the month has much fewer working days than last year due to the long Lunar New Year holiday,” said Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy Ahn Dukgeun in a statement.The holiday fell on Jan.27-30, or Monday-Thursday, while some companies such as automakers closed on Jan.31 to extend the festival to a full week.
STRONG AI CHIP DEMANDSemiconductor exports, which account for about 20% of South Korea’s total overseas sales, grew 8.1% to $10.1 billion, extending a winning streak to 15 months, thanks to healthy demand for premium products such as high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips.“Exports of high-capacity and high-value memory chips for AI and servers maintained strong growth momentum due to increasing investment in data centers worldwide,” said the ministry.
Sales to China, South Korea’s No.1 overseas market in 2024, fell 14.1% to $9.2 billion as the mainland celebrated the Lunar New Year holiday on Jan.28-Feb.4, the ministry said.
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