Export-Import Bank of Korea (KEXIM)

Korea Eximbank (KEXIM), formally the Export-Import Bank of Korea, is Korea's official export credit bank. The Export-Import Bank of Korea Act states its purpose as promoting the sound development of the national economy and economic cooperation with foreign countries by providing financial assistance required for export, import, overseas investment and the exploitation of overseas natural resources. The Articles of Incorporation restate that primary purpose in the same terms.

KEXIM is a special juridical entity under Korean law. The Bank of Korea Act and the Banking Act do not apply to it in the manner applicable to commercial banks. It was established in 1976 and has its head office in Seoul. Within Korea's dual official export credit system, KEXIM lends and guarantees while Korea Trade Insurance Corporation (K-SURE) provides export credit insurance. Describing either institution as Korea's sole export credit agency misstates that division of labour.

Mandate as policy bank

KEXIM's mandate covers financial assistance for export and import transactions, overseas investment and overseas natural resource development. That policy bank role is broader than classic tied export credit alone. Government entrusted funds administered by KEXIM, including development and cooperation funds described in official materials, sit beside Arrangement export credits and widen the institution's public finance functions.

For bank desks, KEXIM participation appears in loan, guarantee and security documents as a funded or contingent creditor. An export credit guarantee from KEXIM is a bank style contingent obligation, not an insurance indemnity. Commercial banks may cofinance beside KEXIM or hold K-SURE insurance on parallel tranches.

Products and lending programmes

Lending programmes include export credits to Korean exporters or foreign buyers of Korean goods and services, overseas investment credits to Korean firms, and import credits to Korean importers. Export credits finance manufacture or construction of eligible capital and non capital goods and technical services for export. Eligible capital goods historically include ships, industrial plants, industrial machinery and overseas construction projects.

Direct loans to foreign buyers, project finance to project companies and structured ship finance sit alongside interbank export loans to overseas banks that facilitate imports of Korean goods. Those buyer facing structures align with buyer credit practice. Supplier credit style support can appear where Korean exporters receive financing related to deferred payment exports, while insurance on exporter receivables is typically a K-SURE product rather than a KEXIM indemnity.

Guarantees and letters of credit support approved export and import credit projects. Financial advisory and arranging services appear in official descriptions of project support alongside loans and guarantees.

Eligibility and statutory boundaries

Eligibility turns on the Act and Articles of Incorporation purposes, product specific programme rules, and OECD Arrangement compliance for official medium and long term export credits. KEXIM is not subject to ordinary commercial bank licensing rules in the same way as deposit taking banks, but it remains bound by its statute, presidential decree and articles for the scope of financial assistance it may provide.

Which Korean agency is on risk, which product form applies, and whether Arrangement terms govern the tenor vary by transaction, and a bank facility may connect to KEXIM funding or to K-SURE insurance. Intercreditor clauses allocate ranking among KEXIM, commercial lenders and insurance proceeds where both agencies appear on one transaction.

Korea Eximbank and the OECD Arrangement

Korea is a Participant in the OECD Arrangement on Officially Supported Export Credits. Official medium and long term export credit terms fall under that Participant system. Officially supported export credits with repayment terms of two years or more are subject to Arrangement disciplines on repayment terms, minimum premium benchmarks and related transparency, including minimum interest rate rules where official financing support is provided.

Short term insurance and pure marketable risk cover follow different product rules even when they sit under the national dual system. Peers such as UKEF, Hermes Cover and US EXIM each organise lending and insurance differently within one national framework. Korea separates the policy bank and the trade insurer.

Korea Eximbank is therefore Korea's official export credit bank for loans and guarantees supporting export, import, overseas investment and resource development, aligned with OECD Arrangement disciplines for medium and long term official export credits and complementary to K-SURE insurance capacity.