SEOUL, May 8 (Xinhua) -- South Korea's current account surplus in the first quarter hit the lowest in 27 quarters on weak export, central bank data showed Wednesday.

Current account surplus amounted to 11.25 billion U.S. dollars during the January-March quarter, the lowest since the second quarter of 2012, according to the Bank of Korea (BOK).

It stemmed from an export reduction, which led to lower trade surplus for goods.

Trade surplus for goods stood at 19.61 billion U.S. dollars in the first quarter, the lowest since the first quarter of 2014.

Export, which accounts for about half of the export-driven economy, dipped 8.4 percent from a year earlier to 137.5 billion U.S. dollars in the March quarter. It was the first quarterly fall of export in two and a half years.

It was attributed to lower semiconductor price, global trade slump and soft demand for oil products.

Import retreated 7.6 percent to 117.89 billion U.S. dollars in the quarter on the reduced demand for capital goods and lower global crude oil price.

In March alone, the current account surplus was 4.82 billion U.S. dollars, staying in the black for 83 months in a row. It was down from a surplus of 5.1 billion U.S. dollars tallied a year earlier.

The outbound shipment shrank 9.4 percent from a year earlier to 47.93 billion U.S. dollars in March, while import dipped 9.2 percent to 39.47 billion U.S. dollars in the month.

Services account balance posted a deficit of 2.34 billion U.S. dollars in March, larger than a deficit of 2.26 billion U.S. dollars a year earlier.

Financial account, which gauges cross-border capital flow without transactions in goods and services, logged a net outflow of 6.18 billion U.S. dollars in March. Enditem

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