S.Korea's corporate bond sale logs double-digit fall in February

South Korea's corporate bond sale logged a double-digit fall last month due to higher borrowing cost, financial watchdog data showed Thursday.

Corporate bond issuance came in at 14.09 trillion won (11.6 billion U.S. dollars) in February, down 17.0 percent from the previous month, according to Financial Supervisory Service.

It was attributed to the higher borrowing cost. The country's central bank hiked its key rate by a quarter percentage point to 1.25 percent in January, after raising it by 25 basis points in August and November each last year.

Industrial companies sold bonds worth 5.38 trillion won (4.4 billion U.S. dollars) in February, down 5.6 percent from a month earlier.

The issuance of bonds by financial companies dropped 24.4 percent to 8.26 trillion won (6.8 billion U.S. dollars) in the cited month, but the sale of asset-backed securities (ABS) advanced 25.5 percent.

Corporate equity financing, including the initial public offering (IPO) and the rights issuance, tumbled 86.6 percent over the month to 1.41 trillion won (1.2 billion U.S. dollars) in February.

The double-digit reduction came after LG Energy Solution, the country's biggest automotive battery producer, went public on the main stock market in January.