Woori Financial Group relaunches brokerage arm

Woori Financial Group has returned to South Korea’s brokerage service market after a decade with the launch on Thursday of Woori Investment & Securities Co.

The brokerage unit merged the online fund sales platform Korea Foss Securities Co. with Woori Investment Bank, the country’s last merchant bank to deal mainly in commercial loans and real estate project financing.

Woori Financial acquired a majority stake in Korea Foss Securities in May.

The country’s No. 4 financial services group branded the merged entity as Woori Investment & Securities. That is the namesake of its former brokerage arm it sold in 2014 to Nonghyup Financial Group to ease liquidity problems.

With equity capital of 1.1 trillion won ($804 million), the newly launched brokerage company is now the 18th-largest player in the domestic sector.

Woori aims to grow it into one of the country’s top 10 investment banks within five years.

Over the past 10 years, Woori had been the only financial services firm among financial majors in Korea without a brokerage service unit.

Nam Ki-Cheon, current CEO of Woori Investment Bank, will lead the new brokerage firm as its chief executive.

Its operations will comprise general financial services; sales and trading; retail services; and risk management.

An official from Woori Investment & Securities said it will distinguish itself by creating synergy with its affiliated companies under Woori Financial Group and strengthening digital service platforms to expand investment banking business and offer various financial products.

It is also gearing up for venture capital and private banking services. 

In the second quarter ended in June, Woori Financial Group posted its highest-ever net profit of 931.4 billion won, up 49% from 625.2 billion won a year earlier.

Write to Sung-Mi Shim at smshim@hankyung.com
Yeonhee Kim edited this article