The Won-Dollar exchange rate is the amount of Korean Won needed to buy one US Dollar. When the number goes down, the Won strengthens; when it goes up, the Won weakens. Given the recent decline, the most pressing question is likely, “Has it fallen enough to rebound, or will it fall further?”
The current answer is that while there are conditions supporting further decline, high US interest rates and inflation remain on the other side. Rather than simply extending the early September outlook, it’s time to examine which of the previous assumptions still hold and which have changed. This article first summarizes the confirmed facts and then explains the conditions that strengthen and refute each of the mixed, further decline, and rebound scenarios for the next 1-3 months.
The data reference time is October 5, 2026, 1:04 PM, Korean Standard Time. It uses the latest verifiable closing prices for Seoul spot exchange and official US statistics. This outlook does not consult real-time offshore quotes.
1. When and Where Was the Exchange Rate We Are Seeing Now Formed?
October 5th is a substitute public holiday for Gaecheonjeol (National Foundation Day). Even if numbers are displayed on screen during a domestic holiday, they should not be interpreted as the new closing price for the Seoul spot exchange market on that day. The holiday schedule can be confirmed on the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute’s 2026 Calendar.
Recent closing prices must also be divided into two times. According to eDaily’s report citing Seoul Money Brokerage, the weekly closing price on October 2nd at 3:30 PM was 1,350.6 Won, and the overnight closing price on October 3rd at 6:00 AM, reflecting US employment figures, was 1,344.2 Won. The latter is 6.4 Won lower than the preceding weekly closing price. The 1,365.1 Won mentioned in the article is the weekly closing price on September 28th, so it cannot be used as the previous Friday’s value to calculate weekly returns. eDaily’s report on weekly and overnight closing prices
These two values are cited by the media from brokerage data, and this article has not directly obtained the raw time series from the brokerage. Therefore, they are used as the most recently verifiable domestic closing prices, but are not referred to as “October 5th real-time exchange rate.” Monthly returns or decline rates from past highs are also not calculated by connecting numbers from different times.
It is also necessary to distinguish between banks’ standard exchange rates, the cash exchange rates actually applied to travelers, real-time offshore quotes, and NDFs. NDF (Non-Deliverable Forward) is a contract where a future exchange rate is set for trading, and the difference is settled at maturity. Directly comparing forward exchange prices, which reflect maturity and interest rate differentials, with spot exchange closing prices can lead to misinterpreting price differences between different products as market direction. This article does not include unverified offshore, bank, or NDF figures.
2. What to Keep and What to Change from the September 1st Outlook
The previous outlook on September 1st set a gradual decline until November as the basic direction, based on factors such as export dollar supply and narrowing Korea-US interest rate differentials. At the same time, it presented Fed interest rate hikes, rising oil prices, and foreign capital outflow as rebound risks. The price ranges at that time were conditional scenarios, not statistical model confidence intervals.
Among these, the risk of a Fed interest rate hike became a real event. On September 16th, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) raised its policy interest rate target range by 0.25 percentage points to 3.75-4.00%. The starting point for this outlook is the environment after this hike, not a rate cut. Fed September 16th Policy Decision Statement
The Bank of Korea’s base rate has been 3.00% since its increase on August 27th. Compared to the US target range, US interest rates are 0.75-1.00 percentage points higher than Korea’s. The difference using the upper bound of the US range is 1.00 percentage point, and using the lower bound is 0.75 percentage points. Stating
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