HektoInnovation Announces Three-Year Shareholder Return Plan Including Treasury Stock Cancellation

Hecto Innovation announced its 2023 performance, year-end cash dividends, and a three-year shareholder return policy through a disclosure on the 13th.

Hecto Innovation aims to return at least 25% of its separate net profit to shareholders as cash dividends and plans to increase its dividend payout ratio by more than 1% annually from the 2024 fiscal year through the 2026 fiscal year. Additionally, separately from this, the company plans to regularly retire 1% of the total issued shares each year for three years starting in 2024 by utilizing treasury shares currently held, thereby enhancing shareholder value.

Hecto Innovation also announced its 2023 performance. On a consolidated basis, sales increased by 9.7% year-on-year to 288.5 billion KRW, marking the 14th consecutive year of record-high performance. On a separate basis, sales grew by 11.7% year-on-year, reaching a record high of 93 billion KRW. These achievements were driven by stable growth in its core IT-based information service business along with the growth of its subsidiary Hecto Financial’s online payment services.

During the same period, consolidated operating profit reached 37.3 billion KRW, growing 4.5% year-on-year to record the highest level ever, while separate operating profit was 25.4 billion KRW, down 13.9% year-on-year due to costs related to nurturing new platforms. The year-end cash dividend plan for the 2023 fiscal year is 360 KRW per share, with a total dividend amount of approximately 4.5 billion KRW.

Hyuncheol Lee, CEO of Hecto Innovation, stated, “The year 2024 will be a foundational year for efforts to expand shareholder return policies and market communication based on a balance of investment and growth aligned with the government’s corporate value-up support measures.” He added, “We are also revising internal policies linked to enhancing shareholder value, such as setting the CEO’s performance incentives in stock rather than cash and linking the RSU grants for key executives to market capitalization.”

Meanwhile, since its listing on KOSDAQ in 2009, Hecto Innovation has continuously grown, recording a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18.4% in sales over the past five years through 2023. While investing in discovering new growth engines, the company has consistently implemented shareholder-friendly policies such as annual cash dividends.

Actively investing in nurturing new growth engines, Hecto Innovation currently operates Korea’s first MyData-based card benefits platform, “Thessen Card,” and the app-tech platform “Balloso-deuk,” which turns habits into income. Through its subsidiaries, the tech-finance company Hecto Financial and IT healthcare company Hecto Healthcare, it conducts IT technology-based finance, data, and healthcare businesses.