South Korea's current account surplus grew in March to more than ten billion U.S. dollars.
 
Preliminary data from the central bank on Monday shows the surplus reached ten-point-zero-nine billion dollars, the highest monthly surplus since September. 

March also caps off the largest first-quarter current account surplus since the government began keeping such data in the 1980s, at more than 24 billion dollars.
 
With the latest tally, South Korea has now posted current account surpluses for 49 straight months since March 2012.

But a sharp drop in imports cloaked the country's economic downturn. 

Exports stood at 44-point-54 billion dollars, a nine-point-three percent drop from a year ago. But imports fell even more sharply, down 16-point-one percent from a year ago to stand at 32-point-one billion dollars.