The Korea Ocean Business Corporation (KOBC), the safe established in 2018 by the South Korean government to support the industry national shipowner after the traumatic failure of Hanjin Shipping, and the development bank Korea Development Bank (KDB) have officially started the privatization procedure of the shipping company HMM, which is the main national carrier in the container sector. The procedure, which will start with the selection of a group of advisors, will bring the sale of shares in the shareholdings currently held in the company by KDB (20.69%) and KOBC (19.96%).
In 2016, after the latest in a series of liquidity crises, HMM signed an agreement with the creditor banks and Korea Maritime Promotion Agency (now KOBC) which led entry into the capital of the shipping company, as major shareholder, KDB, which has since supported HMM with Estimated investments of over five billion dollars.