SEOUL: South Korean exports for the first 20 days of this month rose 5.9 percent from a year ago but could suffer a decline for the full month, hit by the euro zone crisis, Reuters calculation on the customs data showed on Saturday.
South Korean exports totalled $29.1 billion for the Jan. 1-20 period while imports reached $32.0 billion, generating a deficit of $2.9 billion, data that the Korea Customs Service published on its website.
The performance was worse than a 15.1 percent year-on-year rise in exports for the first 20 days of December 2011, although better than a 2.0 percent gain in the comparable 20-day period of November, Reuters data shows.
But given the shorter working days left until the end of the month than a year earlier, the country's exports for the whole of January could post their first year-on-year decline since October 2009 when the world was pulling out of crisis.
Most South Korean companies will shut plants until Tuesday to celebrate the Lunar New Year holiday, which in 2011 fell in February. It means there will be one less working day left for the rest of the year than in January 2011.
Knowledge Economy Minister Hong Suk-woo already said on Jan. 17 that prospects for exports this month were gloomy and that South Korea could see its first monthly trade deficit in two years in January.
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