In January South Korean merchandise exporters sold US$44.9bn worth of goods (customs basis) overseas, a surge of 46% from the year-earlier period, according to the Korea Customs Service. Notably, exports in January came in higher than the number for December, defying typical seasonality-exports usually drop in January after heady year-end shipments in the previous month. In year-on-year terms in January shipbuilding exports jumped by 275.1%, car exports by 48.2% and steel exports by 46.3%. Exports to the US and the EU soared by 36.1% and 84.5% respectively, outpacing a 15.8% rise in sales to China, South Korea's biggest export market. Meanwhile, merchandise imports rose by 32.9% in January from the year before, accelerating from a 21.7% increase in the previous month.

The BOK reported a current-account surplus of US$2.1bn for December, and US$28.2bn for 2010 as a whole. The full-year surplus shrank from the US$32.8bn that was registered in 2009, when imports began recovering from the 2008-09 global financial crisis. Nevertheless, the merchandise trade surplus expanded to US$41.9bn in 2010 from US$37.9bn in 2009, owing to powerful export growth in 2010. Meanwhile, the service trade deficit widened to US$11.2bn in 2010 from US$6.6bn in 2009.