South Korea is facing a potential financial crisis driven by…fried chicken write Alex Frangos and Kwanwoon Jun:

• The number of fried chicken restaurants in South Korea has skyrocketed, having tripled over the past decade.
• This is in part due to South Korea’s retirement system where employees are often forced to retire in their 50s and have to supplement their small pensions by taking out loans to start small businesses.
• Fried chicken joints are the businesses of choice due to a surge in demand for the food in the country after the 2002 soccer World Cup.
• Now there are 12 restaurants per 1,000 people – six times as many as the United States.
• This is a problem because now there are so many restaurants the vast majority of them fail causing individuals to default on their loans.
• Loan defaults are hurting consumer spending and reducing bank lending – creating the conditions for a financial crisis.
• The South Korean government for its part is trying to mitigate the likelihood of this by banning fried chicken restaurants from opening within 800 meters of one another.

Read more over here.

Source: The Wall Street Journal

Via: Quartz