South Korea’s exports of information and communication technology (ICT) products rose 9.4% on-year in March to $20.58 billion, driven by growing global demand for semiconductors and mobile phone components, the Ministry of Science and ICT said Monday. Imports increased 6.8% to $12.21 billion, resulting in an ICT trade surplus of $8.37 billion. Compared to February, exports surged 24% while the trade surplus jumped 48%, marking the sharpest month-on-month recovery in nearly a year.

Semiconductor exports climbed 11.8% to $13.06 billion, led by high-bandwidth memory (HBM) and DDR5 chips used in artificial intelligence servers. Display panel exports rose 1.3% to $1.64 billion, reversing an eight-month decline as corporate clients stockpiled components ahead of anticipated U.S. tariff changes. Mobile phone exports increased 14.5% to $1 billion, primarily due to rising component shipments to overseas manufacturing bases. Shipments to the U.S. rose 19.4% to $2.77 billion, while exports to China and Hong Kong fell 12.2% to $7.35 billion.