SEOUL, Aug. 18 (Xinhua) -- South Korea's foreign debts hit a record high in the second quarter due to rapid growth in short-term debts, central bank data showed Thursday.
Foreign debts reached a fresh high of 662.0 billion U.S. dollars at the end of June, up 7.9 billion dollars from three months earlier, according to the Bank of Korea.
Short-term debts, which mature in less than a year, advanced 8.9 billion dollars to 183.8 billion dollars in the cited period, but long-term external liabilities reduced 1.0 billion dollars to 478.2 billion dollars.
The proportion of short-term foreign debts to total external liabilities stood at 27.8 percent at the end of June, up 1.0 percentage point from three months earlier.
The ratio of short-term foreign debts to the country's foreign reserves gained 3.7 percentage points to 41.9 percent in the second quarter, marking the highest in 10 years since the second quarter of 2012.
Net external credit, or external credit minus foreign debts, came in at 386.1 billion dollars at the end of June, down 39.6 billion dollars from three months ago. ■