[THE INVESTOR] The share of South Korea’s retail sales that were done on mobile devices reached an all-time high in the second quarter of the year, government data showed on Aug. 17. 

Purchases made through smartphones and tablets surged 41.5 percent on-year to 9.4 trillion won (US$8.25 billion) in the April-June period, according to the data from Statistics Korea.

The figure was equal to 9.4 percent of the nation’s total retail sales of 99.2 trillion won, which rose a mere 3.2 percent from the same period a year earlier.

The second-quarter market share is the largest since the statistics agency began compiling such data in the first quarter of 2013.

The total amount of mobile transactions took up 62.1 percent of all online purchases made in the three-month period, also a record high. South Korea has seen a spike in mobile shopping in recent years as mobile-savvy consumers are increasingly resorting to their ubiquitous smart devices instead of visiting shops in person.

“With a high smartphone penetration rate, mobile shopping has increased sharply as smartphones enable people to shop anywhere,” an agency official said. “Also responsible seem to be shopping malls’ stepped-up promotional activities.”

South Korea is one of the most wired countries in the world with one of the highest smartphone ownership rates. Eight out of 10 South Koreans use a smartphone, according to government data.

In contrast to a sharp rise in mobile shopping, department stores, large discounters and supermarkets suffered setbacks in the second quarter.

Department stores saw their second-quarter sales drop 3.2 percent from a year ago, marking the second straight quarter of decline. Growth in sales of discount chains slowed to 4.8 percent in the second quarter from 6.7 percent three months earlier, with the comparable figure for supermarkets slowing to 3.1 percent from 3.9 percent.

By Alex Lee and newswires (alexlee@heraldcorp.com)