Foreign Securities Firms Earn Billions but Donate Only a Tiny Fraction

9 Companies with Net Profit Over 10 Billion Won
Donations Only 168.27 Million Won
Citigroup Global Markets and Others Have None

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Jihwan] Last year, foreign securities firms that recorded trillion-won sales and net profits in the thousands of billions in South Korea were found to be stingy in social contribution activities.

According to the disclosure by the Korea Financial Investment Association on the 17th, the total donations spent by nine foreign securities firms with net profits exceeding 10 billion won last year amounted to 168.27 million won. During the same period, these securities firms recorded sales of 1.4358 trillion won and net profits of 470.4 billion won in South Korea. This has led to growing criticism that they are neglecting social contribution activities compared to the scale of profits earned domestically.

Despite foreign securities firms recording a large increase in net profits last year thanks to the stock market boom, their donations have declined. Although their net profits increased by 119 billion won (33.9%) in one year, donations decreased by 35 million won (17.2%). The ratio of donations to net profits was 0.036%, down 0.022 percentage points from 0.058% the previous year. This means that for every 10,000 won earned, they used to donate 5.8 won, but last year reduced it to 3.6 won.

In particular, three foreign securities firms?Citigroup Global Markets, Korea SG, and Merrill Lynch?were found to have spent no donations last year. JP Morgan, the top-performing foreign securities firm, cut its donation spending by more than half compared to the previous year. While net profits increased by 46.7 billion won (88.1%) over one year, donation spending decreased by 8 million won (55.2%) from 14.5 million won to 6.5 million won. Credit Suisse, which ranked second in net profit with a 20% increase, also drastically reduced its donation spending from 70.22 million won to 1.5 million won.

Among foreign securities firms last year, UBS Securities donated the most. They donated 109.9 million won, which is 0.23% of their net profit of 43.2 billion won. Next was Morgan Stanley Securities, which recorded net profits of 71.7 billion won and spent 50.69 million won on donations. They increased their donations by 20.8% and 98.1%, respectively, compared to the previous year. In addition, Goldman Sachs and BNP Paribas Securities spent donations at about 0.01% of their net profits. These firms recorded net profits of 40.9 billion won and 13.7 billion won last year, but their donation spending was only 6.6 million won and 2 million won, respectively.

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