三星电子与SK海力士拒绝韩国电力公社（KEPCO）25万亿韩元电费预付方案，KEPCO骨干电网投资转向发债融资

Samsung Electronics (005930.KS) and SK hynix (000660.KS) have declined Korea Electric Power Corp.'s request to prepay 25 trillion won ($18 billion) in electricity bills, adding uncertainty to how the utility will fund its power grid investments. With further electricity rate increases difficult to push through, the loss of a large-scale funding option that would have substituted for bond sales raises the prospect of a heavier borrowing burden from KEPCO bonds and other debt.
Samsung Electronics and SK hynix recently told KEPCO they would find it difficult to take part in the prepayment plan, business sources said on the 14th. Based on the electricity charges the two companies paid last year, KEPCO had been pursuing a plan to collect five years' worth of bills upfront — about 20 trillion won from Samsung Electronics and about 5 trillion won from SK hynix — and use the money to build national backbone power networks. KEPCO said it had not proposed prepayment to any companies other than the two.
The 25 trillion won prepayment plan was designed to cover surging grid construction costs, driven by expanding semiconductor and artificial intelligence investment, without issuing bonds. Supplying power to the Yongin and Honam semiconductor clusters and to AI data centers requires a large-scale buildout of transmission lines and substations. LS Securities estimated the power needed for the three megaprojects at a combined 39.7 gigawatts — 15 GW for the Yongin semiconductor cluster, 18.4 GW for AI data centers and 6.3 GW for the Honam semiconductor cluster.
KEPCO is profitable, but its own cash alone is barely enough to cover the growing investment. LS Securities forecast KEPCO's operating cash flow at 18.192 trillion won this year, against expected spending on tangible and intangible assets of 18.931 trillion won. That means nearly all of the cash generated from operations goes into capital investment. Total borrowings are estimated at around 130 trillion won by the end of this year.
With the prepayment plan off the table, KEPCO must raise the money elsewhere. Unless it raises electricity rates or secures large amounts of outside capital, its reliance on KEPCO bonds and other borrowing could increase. The utility issued 12.21 trillion won of KEPCO bonds through the end of August this year. Issuance yields last month were 4.00% for two-year notes, 4.22% for three-year notes and 4.41% for five-year notes. The larger the borrowing, the heavier the interest costs.
The problem is that KEPCO's capacity to issue bonds is set to shrink. In principle, the ceiling on KEPCO bond issuance is twice the sum of its paid-in capital and reserves. But after a funding squeeze caused by massive losses in 2022, the law governing KEPCO was amended to temporarily allow up to five times that amount — or six times in urgent cases — through the end of 2027. Once the waiver expires at the end of next year, the two-times ceiling applies again.
KEPCO has previously said it would not seek an extension of the waiver and would manage its finances within the two-times ceiling. "We are not considering an extension of the five- to six-times expansion, and we are weighing various options to make financing workable within the existing two-times limit," a KEPCO official said.