□ Korea Eximbank (www.koreaexim.go.kr, Chairman & President Yong Hwan Kim), the leading foreign currency bond issuer in the nation, is making active efforts to strengthen partnerships with key global investment banks.

□ As a part of these efforts, Korea Eximbank hosted a roundtable conference titled “Current Trends and Prospects in International Finance” attended by officials from major global IBs* on September 20 in Hong Kong.

* 15 investment banks participated including Barclays, BNP Paribas, BofA-Merrill lynch, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, HSBC, JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, RBS, UBS, etc.

□ Due to fears of recession in the US and the European debt crisis, commercial banks have recently had much difficulty in issuing foreign currency bonds.

○ Amid such difficult environments, Korea Eximbank hosted the conference for early identification of investor trends and development of effective strategies for foreign currency bond issuance.

□ During the conference, there were in-depth discussions on factors causing instability and uncertainty in global financial markets and how such factors will play out.

○ The first session speaker, Stephen Williams, Head of Asia-Pacific Region of HSBC, stated, “American and European investors, fearing that instability in global financial markets will not be short-lived, are increasingly becoming conservative when it comes to Korean bonds. Under such difficult market conditions, Korea Eximbank wisely targeted niche markets with high liquidity such as Japan and Hong Kong because it is necessary to diversify borrowing markets and investor bases.”

○ During the second session, Chairman Kim emphasized the need to diversify strategies for stable financing of foreign currencies.

○ Chairman Kim stated, “Despite difficult financial market conditions, Korea Eximbank has intensified IR activities such as global investment seminars and conferences. The bank will actively target investors in emerging markets including the Middle East and Asia, which have abundant liquidity, while continuing to utilize existing foreign currency borrowing markets.”

□ On September 9, Korea Eximbank successfully issued a USD 1 billion global bond and became the first Asian institution to do so after the downgrade of America’s credit rating and led the way for Korean institutions in foreign currency borrowing markets.

○ So far, Korea Eximbank has procured a total of USD 7.5 billion comprised of 14 currencies this year and is working to diversify funding sources by attracting investments from the Middle East and China, regions with relatively high levels of liquidity.