South Korea's largest credit card firm, LG Card Co, delayed the first stage of its $4.5 billion bailout for at least a week on Wednesday after two foreign-controlled banks failed to agree to the plan.
The delay slows LG Card's re-capitalisation and follows a delay in selecting a new chief executive. The bailout plan initially agreed last month was designed to rescue the card group from bankruptcy and avert a wider financial crisis.
Adding to pressures on the struggling card firm, other key creditors have recently collected some of emergency loans extended in November.
LG Card said in a filing to the stock exchange it moved the date to offer one trillion won ($856 million) in new shares in a debt-for-equity swap to February 13 from late this week in the original schedule.
The new share issue is to convert the same amount of existing debt into stock, an initial step to swap a total 3.65 trillion won LG Card owes into the firm's shares.
Koram Bank and Korea Exchange Bank (KEB), two of smaller South Korean banks, have not decided to join the aid package, according to LG Card and the banks.