Chung Yong-jin, the vice chairman and de facto head of South Korean department store franchise Shinsegae, announced on Wednesday that the company is pulling its discount chain E-Mart out of China.

Local media have reported that the chain is closing down its business in the world's second-largest economy due to worsening profitability and growth, citing failure to fully assimilate the brand into the local market.

E-Mart will be the first South Korean company to exit China since February, when anti-South Korea sentiment began among Chinese consumers over the deployment of the THAAD missile defense system in the country.

When entering the Chinese market in 1997, Shinsegae had a grand plan of running 1,000 stores in China, and managed 27 stores there as of 2010. 

It now only has seven stores left in the country after a business restructuring, and six of those are expected to be shut down once the rental contract expires.