이 기사는 2022년 04월 14일 08:10 thebell 에 표출된 기사입니다.

Lotte Card is up for sale two and a half years after its acquisition by private equity firm MBK Partners in October 2019.

MBK Partners bought the card company from Lotte Group as the South Korean retail conglomerate shifted to a holding company structure. Under South Korean law, a non-financial holding company is banned from owning stakes in financial services companies.

Lotte Card’s financial performance has continued to improve under the private equity firm’s ownership, with net profit growing more than threefold over the past two years, from 71.4 billion won ($58.1 million) in 2019 to 225.8 billion won in 2021.

Lotte Card is led by Cho Jwa-jin, a brand marketing expert and former chief executive officer of Hyundai Capital America. He was named as CEO of the card company in March 2020.

Under Cho’s leadership, the company introduced the LOCA credit card series in August 2020, which amassed more than one million cardholders in just a year after the launch. It also rolled out a private label credit card, LOLA, in September 2020, in partnerships with Lotte Group’s retail channels. The number of LOLA cardholders exceeded 200,000 in nine months after the launch.

Lotte Card recorded 78.7 trillion won in credit card transaction value in 2021, up 10.6% from 72.3 trillion won in 2019. Its card assets also increased 13% to 12.2 trillion won at the end of 2021 from 10.8 trillion won a year ago.

The company’s loan portfolio has diversified as well. Its loan assets grew 78.5% over the past year to 2.59 trillion won at the end of 2021, with households accounting for less than 10% and real estate project financing and other business loans representing 36% and 47% of the total respectively. This contrasts with other card companies whose loan assets mostly comprise household loans.

Operating profit more than doubled to 285.9 billion won in 2021 from 115.5 billion won in 2020. Return on equity grew from 5.35% to 5.78% and net profit per employee increased from 110 million won to 215 million won in the same period.

The delinquency rate has continued to decline over the past two years, from 1.73% in 2019 to 1.16% in 2020 and 1.0% in 2021. The company's non-performing loan ratio also improved from 1.48% to 0.94%.

Lotte Card has stepped up efforts to speed up digital transformation for future growth. It beefed up its digital division last year and completed the renewal of its mobile app in October. (Reporting by Gi-wook Lee)