The shipbuilding industry is one of the most important manufacturing and pillar industries in Korea and also a major exporter of Korean foreign trade. It brings a huge trade surplus to South Korea every year. A few years ago, South Korea‘s shipbuilding exports, trade surplus in the top seven export industries in South Korea have topped the list year after year, the shipments in 2010 and 2011 were 46.7 billion US dollars and 54.1 billion US dollars, 2012 ship exports The amount dropped below 40 billion U.S. dollars. Therefore, the movement of the shipbuilding market affects South Korea‘s sensitive "economic nerves." Every year and the beginning of the year, the "ups and downs" of the shipping market have become the hot spots of analysis and forecast in the Korean industry.

   Forecast: the shipping market is expected to improve but still sluggish in the short term

   Overall, the financial sectoral and related industries in South Korea are cautious about the outlook for the international shipbuilding market in 2013, but most of them think that the shipping market will be better in 2013 than in 2012. The 2013 South Korean pillar export industry "weather map" published by the Korea Trade Association shows that the shipbuilding industry was "rainy" in 2012 and "cloudy" in 2013, to a higher level in weather. South Korea‘s large enterprise consortium - the National Federation of South Korea‘s economic analysis that the shipbuilding and marine markets, though better than in 2012, but still difficult to get out of the shadow of the world economic slowdown, the debt crisis in Europe. Most market analysts and researchers at several major securities firms in South Korea believe that although the shipping market may have slightly improved, the overall sluggishness of the shipbuilding industry will continue. The market order volume will be slightly higher than that of 2012, but shipbuilding enterprises The total volume of hand-held boats may fall, the current situation of downturn in shipping prices is difficult to change, South Korean shipping companies may lower the market value of listed stocks.

    South Korea‘s "Korea Daily" commissioned a study carried out by ENGIDE, a South Korea securities intelligence company, that showed that the profitability of South Korea‘s major shipping companies will decline in 2013. The study argues that due to the financial crisis in Europe will make the EU member states negative economic growth, as the international shipping finance market center of Europe‘s financing capacity continues to shrink, which will make it difficult for new ship orders increased significantly. According to the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry, several large shipping companies in South Korea will step up their efforts to capture the market in the offshore engineering equipment and liquefied natural gas (LNG) carriers. The global oil and gas exploitation, especially the large-scale development of shale gas and natural gas in the United States, Driven LNG ship orders increased.