On the 5th, the day after Lee Jae-myung's government was inaugurated, Lee Bok-hyun, head of the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS), retired after completing a three-year term. Naturally, the market's attention turns to major cases being investigated by the FSS. In particular, there is a growing interest in how the investigation into SAMBU Construction, a case entangled with political interests, will conclude.
The cases of interest to the market involve the allegations of stock price manipulation against SAMBU Construction and sanctions against MBK and Homeplus. Among them, the MBK and Homeplus case has been promptly reported to the prosecution by the financial authorities, but the FSS is handling administrative sanctions separately.
The SAMBU Construction case was reported to the prosecution based on the inspection results from the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC), which is under the Financial Services Commission after seven months of investigation. However, the prosecution transferred the case back to the FSS's Capital Markets Special Judicial Police. Given that the FSS has conducted a lengthy investigation related to the case, there is a belief that a more prompt investigation could be carried out.
Amid the intertwined retirement of Lee Bok-hyun and the inauguration of the new government, there are claims that the FSS's perspective on this case is bound to change. A senior industry official noted, "I understand that the former head showed significant interest in the SAMBU Construction case," adding, "Isn't it possible that the political interests of the head influenced things directly or indirectly?"
Another market participant stated, "There are many eyes casting doubt on the conclusions regarding Kim Keon-hee," and noted, "It remains to be seen whether the FSS's position will be maintained under the new government and the next head."
Lee Jong-ho, former head of Black Pearl Investment, left a message in a group chat saying, "Check SAMBU tomorrow" just before SAMBU Construction's stock price soared. This raises the possibility that the former head was aware of stock manipulation indications in advance. As the former head is known to be the account manager for Kim Keon-hee, suspicions arose that she may have been involved in this case.
However, the FSS reported that after seven months of investigation, it could not find a connection between the SAMBU Construction case and Kim Keon-hee. The financial authorities filed a complaint against current and former actual shareholders for illegal trading, but excluded Kim from the list of those to be charged. At that time, the former head said, "No evidence had been found to charge Kim Keon-hee."
Within the FSS, there is a coexistence of opinions that even if the case is investigated again, the conclusion will not be much different and that there were parts of the investigation that were rushed at first. One FSS official commented, "If the investigation was done properly, nothing would change regardless of the government or head swap." However, another official pointed out, "There was a tendency for the former head to accelerate the investigation in order to turn it over to the prosecution within his term."
On the 5th, the Democratic Party of Korea, now in power, processed the "Kim Keon-hee special investigation law" at the National Assembly plenary session.
The former head handled several major cases during his tenure. He received positive evaluations for responding swiftly to the restructuring of project financing (PF) to prevent the Taeyoung Construction case, which failed to repay loans, from escalating into a real estate crisis.
However, he also faced criticism for aggressively pushing investigations in certain matters. For instance, the FSS opened a deliberation on sanctions against Mirae Asset Securities for allegedly giving preferential treatment to Kim Sang-hee, a Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker, regarding redemption conditions in connection with the Lime incident. Yet the conclusion was that sanctions could not be imposed.
At that time, even within the FSS, there were complaints that "the investigation was being pushed too hard." Lawmaker Kim filed a damages lawsuit against the former head.