Woori Investment & Securities is all set to go global with the help of a variety of specialists in Investment Banking (IB).

The key to IB business is professional staff with in-depth knowledge and prompt action since the corporate clients might be end up not getting enough capital for IPO due to the downturn in stock market.

The IB division of Woori I&S consists of 5 different sub-groups including Industry 1 and 2 Teams for diverse services in corporate bonds, secondary offerings, and business consultation; Advisory Team for corporate M&A and various consultation, which operates a system to team up the task force upon each deals; Product Team for IPO and overseas securitization which consists of a wide range of groups including IPO 1 and 2 and Global Finance; Project Financing Team for financial services related to real estate development and investment.

Thanks to such diverse specialists, the company swept the Korean 2008 capital market league table and reaffirmed its leadership in IB with No.1 position in the equity capital market (ECM), the debt capital market (DCM) and the M&A market.

In the ECM sector, it was an underwriter for a total of 37 deals, including 18 rights offerings, 5 IPOs, 9 bonds with warrants (BWs), 4 convertible bonds (CBs), and one exchangeable bond (EB).

Ranking first in rights offerings and BWs, Woori I&S turned in solid performances across the entire ECM range to achieve a total issuance amount of 7.4 trillion won for a 14.4% share of the domestic market, including a 57.2 billion won IPO for LG Powercom, listing switches for NHN Corporation.

In the DCM area, Woori maintained No.1 position from the previous year and widened its quantitative lead over the 2nd-place rival.

Amid stiffening market competition, Woori I&S executed a number of major advisory deals in 2008, including M&As for Webzen and Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering. On the strength of these successes, Woori was the only domestic securities company to be ranked among the Top 10 on Bloomberg’s Korean M&A deal league table in both 2007 and 2008.

As of the end of 2008, Woori I&S’ executed Principal Investment (PI) balance stood at 302.5 billion won. In managing PI account, it takes into consideration such criteria as profitability, cash flow, growth potential, future outlook and exit strategy,and also conduct a conservative investment review process and thorough post management.

While maintaining Woori I&S’ domestic market dominance in 2009, it anticipates many new opportunities in the IB field in the Asian region and the start of full-fledged regional competition in Asia.

 Based on its rising presence in the home market, Woori has been aggressively seeking to expand into China and Southeast Asia to discover niche markets and secure first-mover advantage there.

Woori established Woori Investment Asia Pte. Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary in Singapore in September 2007 to advance into Southeast Asia, and is also preparing to set up a $100 million hedge fund there within two months.

At present, the Singapore office employs nine local and Korean investment bankers to function as Asia headquarters of Woori, it plans to increase its organization and business.

By Shin, Kirim
아주경제= 신기림 기자 kirimi99@ajnews.co.kr
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