Yen weakens, Koreans rush to exchange: Travel card spending hits record highs

With the peak summer vacation season in full swing, card companies are rolling out a wave of travel perks targeting overseas travelers. Payment benefits aimed at Japan-bound tourists are taking center stage as the won-yen exchange rate has recently fallen to the 880-won range.

Travelers planning a Japan trip can take advantage of Hyundai Card's NOL partnership through Aug. 31. Hyundai Card teamed up with NOL, a travel, leisure and culture platform, to add accommodation, tour and ticket discounts to its "Japan partnership service." The service, launched in June 2024, draws about 10,000 users a month.

Through the NOL tie-up, accommodations are discounted 7%. The offer covers Tokyo, Osaka, Fukuoka and Okinawa, with discounts of up to 40,000 won on purchases of 100,000 won ($71) or more. Participating properties include Prince Park Tower Tokyo, Candeo Hotels Osaka The Tower, Swissotel Nankai Osaka, Fukuoka Miyako Hotel Hakata and ANA InterContinental Manza Beach Resort Okinawa.

For tours and tickets, 5% discount coupons (up to 100,000 won) and 4% discount coupons (up to 3,000 won) are available across all regions of Japan. NOL bus tours in Sapporo and Fukuoka are also discounted 7%, saving travelers up to 20,000 won.

Any Hyundai Card member can use the service without additional conditions. Coupons are available through the "NOL" menu under "Japan partnership service" in the Hyundai Card app. Since each coupon carries its own discount cap, cardholders are better off splitting payments by category — accommodations, tours and tickets separately — to maximize each limit rather than bundling everything into a single transaction.

For debit card users, timing the exchange rate is key. According to Hana Card, which holds the largest share of overseas debit card spending among card issuers, the Hana Money Travelogue platform recorded 416.7 billion won in currency exchanges in July, with 495,000 members exchanging currency — both monthly records since the service launched.

Yen exchanges drove the surge. Yen conversions totaled 207.5 billion won in July, up 171% from the previous month's 76.4 billion won. US dollar exchanges also rose sharply, climbing 105% from 19.2 billion won to 39.4 billion won, while Chinese yuan exchanges grew a more modest 13%, from 17.1 billion won to 19.3 billion won.

The key takeaway: consumers bought foreign currency in advance when exchange rates dipped. During periods of yen and dollar rate declines in July, users made use of the Hana Money app's "target rate auto-exchange" and "rate alert" features, which automatically execute an exchange when a user's desired rate is reached.

Managing leftover foreign currency is another money-saving angle. With Travelogue, unused foreign currency after a trip can be put toward overseas stock investments, gifted to family or friends, or simply held for the next trip — eliminating the small-change losses that typically come with cash exchanges.

Koreans spent 8.03 trillion won on credit cards abroad in the first half of this year, with Hyundai Card accounting for roughly one in four transactions, according to the Credit Finance Association. The figure covers personal credit card overseas spending — both lump-sum and installment purchases — by nine card issuers: Samsung Card, Shinhan Card, KB Kookmin Card, Hyundai Card, Lotte Card, Hana Card, Woori Card, BC Card and NH Nonghyup Card. The total was up 9.3% from 7.35 trillion won in the same period last year.

Hyundai Card led all issuers in overseas credit card spending in the first half, posting 2.1 trillion won — up 13.8% from 1.84 trillion won a year earlier and accounting for 26.1% of the nine-issuer total. The gap between Hyundai Card and second-place Samsung Card (1.44 trillion won, 17.9%) reached 660 billion won. Shinhan Card ranked third at 1.26 trillion won, followed by KB Kookmin Card at 1.07 trillion won and Hana Card at 626.9 billion won.

The result reflects Hyundai Card's strategy of doubling down on credit cards while bank-affiliated issuers have focused on debit-based travel cards. In the first half of last year, Hyundai Card's overseas debit card spending was just 9.2 billion won, accounting for only 0.5% of its total overseas transactions. Samsung Card (0.1%) and Lotte Card (0.6%) were in a similar position. Corporate-affiliated card issuers face structural barriers to offering travel debit cards, which require bank account linkage, leaving them with little choice but to compete on credit cards alone.

Bank-affiliated issuers tell a different story. In the first half of last year, 70.4% of Hana Card's overseas spending came from debit cards, and Shinhan Card's share stood at 46.6%. NH Nonghyup Card (40.7%), Woori Card (38.4%) and KB Kookmin Card (27.0%) followed. These issuers have made fee-free currency exchange a selling point of their travel debit cards.

Rankings shift depending on the metric. On credit cards alone, Hyundai Card leads with a 26.1% share. But when debit and prepaid cards are included in total personal overseas spending, Shinhan Card ranked first with a 20.2% share in the first half of last year, followed by Hana Card at 18.6%.

The overseas payments market continues to expand. According to the Bank of Korea's report on residents' overseas card usage in the first quarter of 2026, combined credit and debit card spending abroad reached $6.1 billion — a record for any first quarter. That was up 14.2% from $5.35 billion in the first quarter of last year. As overseas payment demand grows, competition among card issuers for customers is expected to intensify further.