A global investment bank has predicted that Korea's per capita gross domestic product (GDP) will reach $81,000 within 50 years.

In the article “How Solid are the BRICs?,” appearing in the bank's report Global Economics Paper No. 134 and released Thursday (Jan. 25), Goldman Sachs estimates that Korea's per capita GDP increase will make the nation the world's second-richest economy after the United States.

Goldman Sachs projected solid economic growth for the nation and proposed adding Korea to the grouping of four rising economic powers known as BRICs; changing the acronym for Brazil, Rusia, India and China to BRICKs.

The bank also named ten other economies that may emerge as important players by 2050. They are Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, Turkey and Vietnam.

A Hong Kong newspaper quoted the bank's global economic outlook report as saying Korea, the eleventh-richest economy in terms of GDP at $814 billion in 2006, will become the ninth richest by 2025.