U.S. rate hike to have little impact on S. Korea: official

SEOUL/SEJONG, Dec. 17 (Yonhap) -- The U.S. Federal Reserve's decision to raise its interest rates for the first time in nine years will have little impact on South Korea, a senior government official said Thursday. Chairing a macroeconomic and financial policy meeting in Seoul, Vice Finance Minister Joo Hyung-hwan said the decision to raise rates by 0.25 percentage point was roughly in line with market expectations. The Federal Open Market Committee moved to raise the target range of the federal fund rate from 0 to 0.25 percent, to 0.25 to 0.50 percent. He stressed since South Korea's fundamentals are solid, the country will be little affected by potential volatility that may pose problems to emerging economies. Joo, however, said that as a precaution, Seoul will beef up monitoring of market developments and be ready to implement contingency plans if the need arises. He also said the government will check the country's foreign currency liquidity so it will be in a good position to respond to emergency situations. In the past, rate hikes by the Federal Reserve have led to outflows of capital in some emerging economies that have raised overall volatility in the global financial sector.