Two major South Korean real estate investment and asset management firms, Korea Real Estate Investment & Trust (KOREIT) and Korea Asset Management Trust, recorded a significant decline in operating profits of around 60% last year compared to the previous year.
The drop was mainly attributed to rising costs in the debt-dependent asset management sector without sufficient profits to offset the expenses. Data showed that Korea Asset Management Trust posted an operating profit of 9 billion won in 2025, marking a 61.1% decline from 23.1 billion won in 2024.
This downward trend has continued since 2024, as profits fell sharply from 104.6 billion won in 2023 to less than 10 billion won in 2025. The primary reasons behind the decline were lower fee income and higher expenses, particularly loan interest costs.
Korea Asset & Trust generated fee income of 61.7 billion won, representing a 27.4% decrease compared to the previous year, while interest expenses rose significantly from 13.9 billion won to 26.1 billion won. Despite these challenges, the company’s net profit increased to 25.4 billion won, supported by non-operating income.
Meanwhile, KOREIT reported operating profits of 28.3 billion won, down 57.2% from 66.3 billion won in the previous year, due to declining fee revenues and rising operational costs.
KOREIT and Korea Asset Management Trust currently rank among the largest real estate asset management firms in South Korea in terms of assets under management. KOREIT’s assets reached approximately 1.65 trillion won in 2025, followed by Korea Asset Management Trust with around 1.3 trillion won.
