JEJU, South Korea, July 31 (Reuters) - South Korea is on course to achieve a $30 billion trade surplus by year's end as it is expected to have already reached its earlier forecast of $23 billion by the end of this month, Economy Minister Choi Kyung-hwan said on Saturday.
'Our economy has been recovering at a faster pace than expected. It is a recovery led by exports and large business groups,' he told a forum in the southern resort island of the country.
In the first half, the world's ninth-largest exporter posted a record trade surplus of $19 billion, easily topping the government's half-year forecast.
Demand for semiconductor parts and cars from China and other emerging markets powered exports higher, helping Samsung Electronics, the world's top memory chipmaker and Hyundai Motor to report their biggest-ever net profits during the first half.
The sputtering U.S. economy and the cooling Chinese economy may cool global demand in the latter part of this year, but analysts say South Korean exporters are seen as more resilient than their peers in the region thanks to their product competitiveness.
The softening won is also believed to have been behind strong South Korean exports.
The won is the worst performing currency in Asia, down 1.5 percent against the dollar on the year to date, due in part to government intervention seen as aiming to curbing the currency's advance so that exporters maintain price competitiveness over Japanese rivals in overseas markets.
(Reporting by Kim Yeon-hee; Editing by Gary Hill) Keywords: KOREA ECONOMY/SURPLUS
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