FX.co ★ Top 5 largest South Korean companies by market capitalization

Samsung Electronics

Samsung Electronics, one of the world’s leading electronics manufacturers, is the most valuable company in South Korea. Its market capitalization exceeds $400 billion. Since the beginning of 2021, it has lost $15,3 billion of its market cap due to a 20% slump in the value of its shares. However, analysts believe that the stocks of the world’s top producer of memory chips may surge by almost 40% within the year. The growth of the South Korean semiconductor industry is likely to contribute to it. In the longer term, the industry may attract more than $450 billion in investments.

SK Hynix

SK Hynix is another company that could benefit from the potential boom in the Korean semiconductor market. It is the world’s third-largest producer of microchips and the fifth-largest producer of RAM chips, with a market capitalization of more than $56 billion. Earlier, SK Hynix announced it had completed development of a unique type of memory chip for data centers and machine learning platforms. This is why the company has good growth potential.

LG Chem

LG Chem, the chemical industry subsidiary of LG Corporation, is the third largest company by market capitalization in South Korea. It is valued at more than $56 billion. This company specializes in the production of eco-friendly biomaterials and pharmaceuticals, however the company is mainly focused on production of materials for batteries. Today, LG Chem seeks to become the world’s biggest manufacturer of cathode materials for electric car batteries. By 2026, the company intends to increase production by 650% - from 40,000 tons to 260,000 tons.

Naver Corporation

Naver is the biggest web portal and the most popular search engine in South Korea. Today, its market capitalization totals more than $51 billion. Over the past 12 months, its share price has gained 30%. However, in early autumn, the price per share dropped 8% due to pressure on IT companies from the financial regulator. This is the largest decline in shares of IT companies last seen 6 years ago. The company was also criticized for the rapid growth caused by the leading position in the local market of online services. Naver Corporation is currently looking for new business possibilities abroad.

Kakao

Similar to Naver, Kakao was also probed by the regulator for its monopoly on the market. Kakao develops products for the local market. Its most popular service, the KakaoTalk messenger, is used by most people in South Korea. Kakao has been constantly adding new services, from mobile banking to taxi services, which helped the company grow rapidly. Notably, its stock price has climbed 78% since the beginning of 2021. Due to regulatory pressure, its stock price began falling. However, there is no serious competition on the South Korean market that would threaten the company’s position.