South Korea June industrial output slips, misses expectations

SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korea's industrial output fell by a seasonally adjusted 0.2 percent in June from May, Statistics Korea said on Friday, missing market expectations.

Semiconductor output shone while most other sectors fell.

The median forecast in a Reuters survey of analysts was for June industrial output to be 0.2 percent higher than in May.The June reading follows a revised 2.7 percent rise in May, versus the preliminary 2.5 percent gain reported earlier.

On an annual basis, industrial output rose 0.8 percent in June after a revised 4.7 percent gain in May, outperforming a median 0.5 percent incline tipped in the same survey.

May figures were strong because of a one-off base effect due to a Middle East respiratory syndrome outbreak in May 2015.

"While the fall was smaller than what we had in mind, the figure relied heavily on semiconductors when most other industries struggled," a finance ministry official said, adding that factory output for July may be poor.

Output of semiconductors jumped 11.1 percent from a month earlier, while production of automobiles and transportation equipment fell 2.5 percent and 6.1 percent respectively.

Service sector output rose by 1 percent in seasonally adjusted terms in June on-month, posting the fastest jump since December and saving the overall output figure from falling further.

(Reporting by Christine Kim and Cynthia Kim; Additional reporting by Shinhyung Lee; Editing by Eric Meijer)