Hantuyeon Criticizes FSC's Partial Resumption of Short Selling as "Simply an Election Strategy"

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Jihwan] The Korea Stock Investors Association (KOSIA) criticized the financial authorities' decision to partially resume short selling focused on large-cap stocks starting May 3 as an "election-driven measure."

Jung Eui-jung, CEO of KOSIA, stated on the 3rd, "In short, I see this as an election-driven measure," adding, "We plan to launch a campaign against the government."

He pointed out, "If the index falls due to short selling of large-cap stocks, linked index products will cause other stocks to also fall, making it impossible to escape the downward spiral," and criticized, "This lame measure fails to break the structure where short sellers continue to easily take individual investors' assets."

CEO Jung said, "It is only a matter of time before the KOSPI falls back to the 2000 level," and criticized, "It is clear negligence of duty to ignore the public outcry by the Financial Services Commission's complacent response, which fails to present fundamental measures against the public harm caused by short sellers earning 39 times more than individual investors and instead settles for a temporary fix."

The Financial Services Commission held an emergency meeting on the same day and decided to extend the temporary ban on short selling, which has been in place since last year, until May 2. The temporary short selling ban, initially applied until March 15, will be extended until May 2. From May 3, short selling will resume only for the constituent stocks of the KOSPI 200 and KOSDAQ 150 indices. The ban on short selling for stocks outside the KOSPI 200 and KOSDAQ 150 will be extended indefinitely.

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