Four Lime Trade Finance Fund Sellers Fully Compensate Investment After Trials and Tribulations

Woori Bank, Hana Bank, Shinhan Investment Corp, Mirae Asset
All Decide to Accept FSC Adjustment Proposal

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Hyo-jin] Four sellers of the Lime Trade Finance Fund, including Woori Bank, Hana Bank, Shinhan Financial Investment, and Mirae Asset Daewoo, have unanimously accepted the Financial Supervisory Service's (FSS) dispute mediation plan for 'full compensation of investment principal.'

This is the first time that 100% compensation has been made in a financial investment product dispute.

According to the financial sector on the 27th, Woori Bank and Hana Bank held board meetings in the afternoon and resolved to accept the FSS mediation plan.

Acceptance after two months of deliberation for consumer protection and other reasons
First case of '100% compensation' in financial investment product dispute mediation

A Woori Bank official explained, "The board meeting in July postponed the decision once to conduct a thorough legal review," adding, "We reaffirmed that this case is a significant matter for consumer protection, restoring trust, and stabilizing the financial market, and made this decision accordingly."

It is known that Woori Bank's board also judged that it was necessary to minimize management uncertainties amid expectations that the domestic and international economic recovery in the second half of the year would be slow due to the recent resurgence of COVID-19.

A Hana Bank official said, "Despite ongoing legal procedures such as prosecution investigations and criminal trials related to this fund, we decided to accept the FSS Dispute Mediation Committee's plan considering the need for prompt investor protection measures for customers."

The Hana Bank official also explained, "According to the FSS investigation, Lime Asset Management and Shinhan Financial Investment, the swap securities company, concealed the insolvency of the Lime Trade Finance Fund and sold it," adding, "Since criminal trials are underway on charges of fraud under criminal law, Hana Bank plans to actively pursue legal actions such as subrogation claims and damages claims against the related companies."

Shinhan Financial Investment stated, "Although there are legal disagreements regarding the dispute mediation decision and concerns about possible side effects on the capital market from accepting the mediation decision, we have no choice but to accept it to fulfill our promise to customers and protect investors, reflecting the mediation results agreed with customers during the Lime Fund pre-compensation in May."

Mirae Asset Daewoo also held a board meeting on the same day and decided to accept the FSS mediation plan. Mirae Asset Daewoo announced, "After careful consideration with customer protection as the top priority, we plan to return the entire sales amount of 9.1 billion KRW to investors."

The FSS Dispute Mediation Committee passed a mediation plan in June applying 'contract cancellation due to mistake,' ordering sellers to return the full principal to investors of the Lime Asset Management Trade Finance Fund. This is the first '100% investment compensation plan' in the history of financial investment product dispute mediation.

The FSS initially set the acceptance deadline as the 27th of last month, but extended it to this day at the request of sellers who needed more time for careful review.

The sales amounts of the Lime Trade Finance Fund are 65 billion KRW for Woori Bank, 36.4 billion KRW for Hana Bank, 42.5 billion KRW for Shinhan Financial Investment, and 9.1 billion KRW for Mirae Asset Daewoo.

Meanwhile, Hana Bank also prepared additional customer protection measures for the Discovery Fund and Italy Healthcare Fund through the board meeting on the same day.

Although losses for these funds have not been confirmed, Hana Bank explained that as a measure to protect customers, it will first provide a certain level of advance payments (50% for the Discovery Fund and 70% for the Italy Healthcare Fund) and settle the final amount when the funds are liquidated in the future.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.