Korea’s top 10 conglomerates owned land worth more than 60 trillion won ($55.5 billion) thanks to their massive investment in real estate amid the prolonged property market slump

April 7, 2014 Leave a comment

Updated : 2014-03-23 19:18

Conglomerates expand land purchases

By Kim Rahn
Korea’s top 10 conglomerates owned land worth more than 60 trillion won ($55.5 billion) thanks to their massive investment in real estate amid the prolonged property market slump, a report showed Sunday. 
This is the first time that the combined value of chaebol-owned land has exceeded 60 trillion won. Samsung, Hyundai Motor and Lotte groups held land worth over 10 trillion won, each.
Chaebul.com, an online market research provider, said 93 listed firms of the top 10 business groups had land worth 60.3 trillion won at the end of 2013, up 4.8 percent from 57.5 trillion won a year before.
“Despite low profits last year amid the sluggish economy, those groups bought land not only for operations such as building or factory sites but also for investment gains such as earnings from leasing,” the research agency said.
By group, Samsung, Lotte, LG, Doosan, Hyundai Heavy Industries and Hanjin expanded their land purchases, while Hyundai Motor, SK, Hanwha and GS reduced theirs.
Eleven affiliates of Hyundai Motor Group owned land worth 11.9 trillion won for operation purposes and worth 650 billion won for investment gains. The values dropped 0.5 percent and 2.6 percent, respectively, from a year ago, but the combined value of the group’s land was still the highest among all groups.
For Samsung, lands held by its 17 subsidiaries were worth 11.7 trillion won, up 4.8 percent.
Lotte’s eight affiliates held the third highest value of land at 10.7 trillion won. LG Group and SK Group had land worth 4.9 trillion won and 4.6 trillion won, respectively.
The value of Doosan Group’s lands hiked 33.8 percent to 4.1 trillion won after the group reassessed the land values of its six affiliates.
By individual affiliate, Lotte Shopping held the highest value of land at 7.9 trillion won. The company’s land increased last year as it merged with other affiliates such as Himart Logitec. Land accounted for 30.3 percent of the firm’s total assets, according to the report.

Filed under Macro Trends

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