In the First Half of the Year, 650,000 Credit Lines Opened at 17 Banks... New Loans Total 23 Trillion Won

Seoul Jung-gu Hana Bank Headquarters Sales Department./Photo by Jinhyung Kang aymsdream@

[Asia Economy Reporter Kwangho Lee] In the first half of this year, 650,000 overdraft accounts were opened at 17 domestic banks (excluding Export-Import Bank and Industrial Bank of Korea), resulting in new loans amounting to 23 trillion KRW.

According to data submitted by the Financial Supervisory Service to Jeon Jae-su, a member of the National Assembly's Political Affairs Committee from the Democratic Party of Korea, a total of 653,000 overdraft loan accounts were newly opened in the first half of this year.

By age group, people in their 30s and 40s each opened 198,000 new overdraft accounts, while those in their 50s opened 139,000 new accounts. This was followed by 58,000 accounts for those aged 60 and above, and 61,000 accounts for those aged 20 and below.

The amount newly loaned through overdraft accounts was 23.3 trillion KRW.

By age group, those in their 30s accounted for the largest amount at 7.8 trillion KRW, followed by those in their 40s with 7.5 trillion KRW, those in their 50s with 4.9 trillion KRW, those aged 20 and below with 1.9 trillion KRW, and those aged 60 and above with 1.2 trillion KRW.

Demand for overdraft loans did not decrease even in the first half of the year, pushing the outstanding balance over 60 trillion KRW.

The outstanding balance of overdraft loans has continuously increased from 45.1 trillion KRW at the end of 2017, 49.4 trillion KRW at the end of 2018, 51.7 trillion KRW at the end of 2019, 58 trillion KRW at the end of 2020, to 60.8 trillion KRW in the first half of this year.

However, the number of overdraft loan accounts slightly decreased after reaching a peak at the end of last year. The number of overdraft loan accounts increased continuously from 4,628,000 at the end of 2017, 4,689,000 at the end of 2018, 4,780,000 at the end of 2019, 4,939,000 at the end of 2020, but slightly decreased to 4,916,000 as of the end of June this year.