South Korea stays on US foreign‑exchange monitoring list

The U.S. Treasury Department’s semiannual foreign‑exchange report kept South Korea on its list of economies whose currency policies are under monitoring, alongside China, Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, Vietnam, Germany, Ireland, Switzerland and Thailand. The watchlist, unchanged from the January report, is applied to partners that meet at least two of three criteria: a bilateral trade surplus with the United States of at least $15 billion, a current‑account surplus of at least 3 % of GDP, and persistent one‑sided FX intervention.

South Korea satisfies the trade‑surplus and current‑account‑surplus thresholds, with a 6.6 % of‑GDP current‑account surplus driven largely by semiconductor and technology exports. The Treasury noted that the Korean won remains under sustained depreciation pressure despite these strong fundamentals, and that Korea did not meet the third criterion for persistent, one‑sided intervention.

The report underscored the won’s depreciation pressure and highlighted ongoing foreign‑exchange market restrictions, while noting progress in easing those limits to improve liquidity and price discovery.