Kookmin Bank (original) (raw)

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South Korean bank

Kookmin Bank

Company type Subsidiary
Industry financial sector Edit this on Wikidata
Founded 1 November 1963; 61 years ago (1963-11-01)
Headquarters Seoul, South Korea
Key people Hur Yin, (CEO)
Products Financial services
Number of employees 26,000
Parent KB Financial Group
Korean name
Hangul 국민은행
Hanja 國民銀行
Revised Romanization Gukmin/Gungmin Eunhaeng
McCune–Reischauer Kukmin Ŭnhaeng
Website omoney.kbstar.com

Kookmin Bank (Korean: 국민은행), also known as KB Kookmin Bank, is a bank headquartered in Seoul, South Korea. It was the largest bank in Korea and the 60th largest in the world as of 2017.[1] The name Kookmin Bank is a contraction of Citizens National Bank, an English name by which it also used to be referred to in the past.

The Citizens National Bank was founded by the Korean government in late 1962,[2]: 43 initially focused on providing financial services for middle- and low-income consumers. Its privatization process was initiated by the sale of a 10 percent stake by initial public offering in 1994.[3]: 35 Meanwhile, Kookmin Bank expanded abroad by opening operations in Luxembourg in 1991, Tokyo in 1992, Singapore in 1994, and Hong Kong in 1996, followed by other locations around the world.[4]

Following the 1997 Asian financial crisis, Kookmin Bank absorbed a number of distressed or insolvent banks, including Daedong Bank in 1998, then Long-Term Credit Bank as announced on 11 September 1998,[5] then Housing & Commercial Bank [ko] in 2001.[6]: 32 In May 1999, Goldman Sachs invested $500 million into KB and became its largest single shareholder with a 17 percent equity stake, ahead of the Korean government which at the time held 7.2 percent.[7] By 2002, Goldman Sachs had sold most of its investment with a significant profit.[8] At that point, Kookmin had become the largest bank in South Korea.[9]: 35 The privatization process was completed in December 2003.[10]: 65

In September 2004, Kookmin Bank said it would restate its 2003 and 2004 earnings after a financial watchdog found that the bank avoided $270 million in taxes.[11]

KB further acquired various companies include credit card, insurance and brokerage firms, transforming into the current financial group in 2008.[12]

  1. ^ "국내 1위가 세계 60위…국내은행 글로벌 경쟁력은". 2017-09-10.
  2. ^ Byung-sun Choi (1991), "The Politics of Financial Control and Reform in Korea" (PDF), Korean Journal of Policy Studies (6): 41–73
  3. ^ A. Michael Andrews (January 2005), State-Owned Banks, Stability, Privatization, and Growth: Practical Policy Decisions in a World Without Empirical Proof, International Monetary Fund
  4. ^ "Old Kookmin Bank". KB Kookmin Bank.
  5. ^ "Merger between the Kookmin & the Korea Long Term Credit bank". Financial Services Commission. 11 September 1998.
  6. ^ Kang H. Park (August 2004), Performance of Korean Banks and Implications for Regulatory Reforms (PDF)
  7. ^ "Kookmin, Goldman Sachs Sign Formal Agreement". Wall Street Journal. 28 May 1999.
  8. ^ "Goldman raises $633M in Kookmin sale". CNN.com. 19 June 2002.
  9. ^ Takatoshi Ito and Yuko Hashimoto (5 February 2007), Bank Restructuring in Asia: Crisis management in the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis and prospects for crisis prevention -Korea- (PDF), Tokyo: RIETI
  10. ^ "2014 KB Financial Group Sustainability Report" (PDF), KB Financial Group
  11. ^ "Kookmin Bank set to revise earnings on probe result". 2014-12-03. Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2013-10-18.
  12. ^ "[인사이드 스토리]한국 금융 M&A". 22 June 2018.