SEOUL, April 23 (Xinhua) -- South Korea's foreign currency deposit fell for the third successive month due to higher demand for import settlement, central bank data showed Tuesday.
The deposit, denominated in foreign currencies, shrank 1.12 billion dollars from a month earlier to 95.01 billion U.S. dollars at the end of March, continuing to slide since January, according to the Bank of Korea (BOK).
The consecutive reduction was attributed to the increased import settlement by local companies and the dollar sale by individuals.
The deposit, denominated in the U.S. dollar, dipped 0.28 billion dollars from a month earlier to 77.59 billion dollars at the end of March.
The Japanese yen and the euro deposits decreased to 9.82 billion dollars and 5.37 billion dollars respectively.
The Chinese yuan deposit came in at 1.01 billion dollars at the end of March, down 0.1 billion dollars from a month earlier.
Foreign currency deposit, owned by companies, reduced by 0.7 billion dollars to 80.05 billion dollars in the cited month, while the individuals-possessed deposit declined 0.42 billion dollars to 14.96 billion dollars. ■
