The Financial Services Commission held an event commemorating the capital market investigation unit’s establishment ten years ago together with the Seoul Southern District Prosecutors’ Office, the Financial Supervisory Service and the Korea Exchange on September 21. The authorities also set out plans to bolster market surveillance, investigation and punishment on unfair trading activities in capital markets.
Speaking about the significance of the work performed by the investigation unit, FSC Chairman Kim Joo-hyun said that along with the increasing number of investors in capital markets in recent years, the nature of unfair trading activities has also become diversified with a growing number of incidents involving more sophisticated and organized forms of crimes taking place. Since unfair trading activities constitute serious crimes that can erode investor confidence in capital markets, Chairman Kim said that it is crucial to maintain stringent countermeasures against them.
In this regard, Chairman Kim emphasized on the importance of the measures being announced today as they are aimed at bolstering market surveillance, investigation and punishment on unfair trading activities in capital markets. More specifically, the measures will first strengthen inter-agency coordination and collaboration among all relevant authorities to ensure that the government’s efforts to counter unfair trading activities are carried out as one team. Second, the authorities will improve the market surveillance and investigation process and shore up organizational capacity to ensure that effective detection, prompt investigation and strict punishment can take place on various types of unfair trading activities. Third, the authorities will work on seamless preparation for the enforcement of penalty surcharges as a newly available means for sanctioning unfair trading activities, while actively seeking to adopt additional sanctions mechanisms including an asset freeze, a trading ban and a ban on serving as an executive officer of a listed company.
The authorities gathered at today’s commemoration event shared the same view on the need to rigorously counter and stamp out unfair trading activities in capital markets through stringent punishment rooted in the policy of zero tolerance.
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