Top 5 Companies Account for Over Half of Q2 Exports, Surpassing Last Year's Top 100 Combined

The top five companies accounted for more than half of South Korea's exports in the second quarter of this year.

The figure even surpassed the total exports of the top 100 companies from a year ago.

As the strong performance continues, centered around semiconductor giants such as Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, the phenomenon of export concentration is accelerating.

According to the Trade Statistics by Enterprise Characteristics on the Korean Statistical Information Service (KOSIS) today (the 19th), exports by the top five companies in the second quarter (April to June) reached $138.21 billion, accounting for 50.2% of total exports ($275.51 billion).

This is the first time that the export share of the top five companies has exceeded 50% since quarterly statistics began in 2015.

The export share of the top five companies first crossed the 30% threshold in the second quarter of last year (30.7%), and has broken record highs for five consecutive quarters, following the third quarter of last year (31.7%), fourth quarter of last year (35.2%), and the first quarter of this year (43.4%).

Driven by this growth, exports by the top five companies in the second quarter of this year exceeded the total exports of the top 100 companies from the second quarter of last year ($116.06 billion) by more than $22.1 billion.

The top five companies' contribution to the increase in export value also expanded further.

Out of the total increase in exports for the second quarter ($100.38 billion), the increase from the top five companies amounted to $84.43 billion, accounting to 84.1% of the total increase.

This is 2.4 percentage points (p) higher than the top five companies' contribution rate to export growth in the first quarter (81.7%).

Among the top 10 companies, the export share held by the top five rose from 86.6% in the first quarter to 90.8% in the second quarter.

As the concentration toward the top five companies intensified, the export growth rate of companies ranked 6th to 10th remained at 5.8% in the second quarter.

Meanwhile, the total exports of all other companies excluding the top five reached $137.3 billion in the second quarter, up 13.1% from the same period last year.

Specifically, companies ranked 6th to 100th recorded an export growth rate of 15.7%, while small and medium-sized enterprises ranked 101st and below posted 10.4%.

Although all groups recorded double-digit growth rates, they fell short of the growth pace of the top five companies (157.0%).

(Photo: Yonhap News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.