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TechRadar's Max Publishes Expert-Approved Headphone Deal Guide for Amazon Prime Big Deal DaysSouth Korea's September exports hit record $120.9 bln as chip sales top $60 blnOpenAI says it disrupted campaign to extract model reasoning, links core activity to Moonshot AIElon Musk’s Grokipedia Gets ‘Newly Refreshed’ v0.3 DesignAtlasBase DNA Storage Targets 50 PB per Capsule, 5 EB per CartridgeGoogle Releases Gemini 4 Argon, Calls It Its Most Powerful Model Yet
AI Chips & Compute

South Korea's September exports hit record $120.9 bln as chip sales top $60 bln

South Korea's September exports rose 83.5 percent to a record $120.9 billion on chip shipments above $60 billion, the trade ministry said Thursday.

AI News Feed · 2026-10-01 10:12

Imports increased 26 percent to $71.09 billion, leaving a trade surplus of $49.85 billion that the ministry described as unprecedented.

Chip exports, a pillar of Asia's fourth-largest economy, climbed 263 percent to $60.3 billion, lifted by higher shipment volumes and prices amid rising demand for memory chips. Petroleum product exports rose 72 percent to $7.22 billion, and petrochemical exports 5.1 percent to $3.95 billion. Cosmetics shipments gained 31.4 percent to $1.51 billion on stronger demand in China, the United States and the European Union.

Automobile exports fell 5.5 percent to $6.05 billion, which the ministry attributed to fewer working days because of the Chuseok holiday and a decline in used-car shipments.

By destination, exports to China jumped 123 percent to $26 billion on semiconductors and wireless communications equipment, exceeding $20 billion for a fourth consecutive month. Shipments to the United States surged 137 percent to $24.33 billion, led by chips, petrochemicals and general machinery. Exports to Southeast Asia rose 92.6 percent to $21.29 billion, and those to the European Union 20.9 percent to $8.65 billion, both helped by chip and automobile sales.

For January through September, exports totaled $814.5 billion, surpassing $800 billion for the first time in a nine-month period and already exceeding last year's full-year record of $709.3 billion.

Finance Minister Lee Hyoung-il told an emergency economic meeting Thursday that annual exports are likely to top $1 trillion this year despite unfavorable external conditions such as the Middle East crisis. He said the economy is on a solid growth track and this year's expansion is likely to be in the 3 percent range, with policy focused on people's livelihoods, inflation stability and narrowing the income gap.

Industry Minister Kim Jung-kwan said the country is on course for $1 trillion in annual exports but identified spreading global protectionism and heightened Middle East tensions as major uncertainties. He said the government will monitor how changes in the global trade environment affect Korean exporters and take preemptive measures to keep unexpected external factors from disrupting shipments.

Editor's Summary South Korea's September exports reached a record $120.9 billion, up 83.5 percent from a year earlier, as semiconductor shipments exceeded $60 billion for the first time and produced a $49.85 billion trade surplus. Nine-month exports of $814.5 billion have already topped last year's full-year record, and the finance and industry ministers both said annual exports could reach $1 trillion despite global protectionism and Middle East tensions.