S. Koreans on overseas shopping spree

South Korea’s overseas credit card spending hit a record quarterly high in the first quarter as a record number of people went abroad for travel, central bank data showed on Thursday. Overseas spending by locals with credit, check and debit cards reached a quarterly peak of $5.07 billion in the January-March quarter, up 26 percent year-on-year, according to the Bank of Korea. A total of 7.43 million South Korean people traveled abroad during the quarter, in which the winter vacation and the Lunar New Year holiday fell. It was up 8.2 percent from the previous quarter.