In one of the clearest indications yet of how the turbulent global trade conditions are affecting South Korea,... new figures show the country's export AND import prices dropped sharply last month.
Kim Ji-yeon reports.
According to the Bank of Korea on Thursday,... the country's import prices fell for the first time since August, mainly due to a drop in international crude oil prices.
Import prices decreased by four-point-six percent on-month... the steepest drop since January 2015.
Dubai crude, Korea's benchmark, slumped more than 17-percent compared to the previous month to around 65 U.S. dollars a barrel in November.
It affected prices of raw materials... which dropped by more than nine-percent compared to the previous month.
Meanwhile, export prices fell for the first time since March.
They dipped by more than two-percent in November compared to the previous month... the steepest drop since April 2016.
The appreciation of the local currency contributed to the drop in export prices.
It was trading at an average of one-thousand-128 won against the greenback,... a zero-point-two-percent drop from a month earlier.
Prices of coal and petrochemical products dropped by more than two-percent on-month... while agriculture, forestry and fisheries prices fell by one-percent.
In particular, the price of Korea's main export, DRAMs dropped by two-percent from the previous month... the fourth straight month of decline.
According to market researcher DRAMeXchange, the average price of the modules fell for the first time in two years in Q4... to 30-U.S. dollars in November.
Kim Ji-yeon, Arirang News.