Stock Manipulation Rewards Exceed 100 Million in First Half... Financial Services Commission to Increase Budget

Government Budget Reward Payments First Year
11.33 Million KRW Paid in First Half of This Year
Average 71.761 Million KRW Annually Over Past 10 Years

In the first half of this year, when the reward system for reporting unfair trading such as stock price manipulation was expanded, a total of 113.3 million KRW in rewards was paid. This amount is 58.2% higher than the average annual reward amount of 71.61 million KRW paid from 2014 to last year.

According to the Financial Services Commission on the 27th, the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) approved four reward payment plans for the first half of this year (February to June). The total payment amount was 113.3 million KRW, which accounts for about 57% of this year's reward budget of 200 million KRW.

The reward for reporting unfair trading had been paid from the Financial Supervisory Service's budget. However, as large-scale stock price manipulation cases occurred consecutively, the reward system was expanded. Accordingly, from this year, the Financial Services Commission has been paying the rewards from the government budget.

The Financial Services Commission plans to request an increase in the reward budget from the Ministry of Economy and Finance. This is based on the judgment that an expansion of the FSC's budget is inevitable as the scale of reward payments has grown compared to the past.

At the end of last year, the FSC fully revised the reporting reward system, raising the reward payment limit from 2 billion KRW to 3 billion KRW. The standard amount for rewards was also increased due to improvements in the calculation criteria.