SEOUL, April 26 (Xinhua) -- South Korea's corporate financing through sales of stocks and bonds posted a double-digit increase in March, financial watchdog data showed Thursday.
Direct corporate financing amounted to 15.62 trillion won (14.5 billion U.S. dollars) in March, up 11.3 percent from the previous month, according to the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS).
The equity financing, which includes the initial public offering (IPO) and rights issuance, more than doubled to 2.25 trillion won (2.1 billion U.S. dollars) in March compared with the prior month.
Rights issuance surged last month as some of the big companies, such as Hyundai Heavy Industries, the world's biggest shipbuilder which is struggling for restructuring process, issued new stocks to improve financial soundness.
The debt financing through corporate bond sales grew 2.5 percent over the month to 13.37 trillion won (12.4 billion U.S. dollars) in March.
Debts, sold by industrial companies, stood at 2.2 trillion won (2.04 billion U.S. dollars), with those by financial firms jumping 43.1 percent to 9.72 trillion won (9.01 billion U.S. dollars).
Sales of asset-backed securities (ABS) gained 6.6 percent in March from a month earlier.