[Special Stock] KakaoPay Falls 4.7% Amid Illegal Support Fund Allegations

Kakao Pay is showing weakness following news that it is under police investigation for allegations of accepting illegal support funds.

As of 1:56 PM on the 4th, Kakao Pay was trading at 46,250 KRW, down 4.74% compared to the previous trading day.

The Financial Supervisory Service recently detected suspicions during a special inspection that Kakao Pay received illegal support funds worth several hundred million KRW from NICE Information & Telecommunication, a value-added network (VAN) operator, and referred the case to the police for investigation.

It was reported that NICE Information & Telecommunication, the agency, paid the agency fees that Kakao Pay was supposed to pay to offline payment merchant recruiters. During two promotional campaigns between 2021 and 2022, NICE Information & Telecommunication is believed to have paid several hundred million KRW on behalf of Kakao Pay.

According to the Specialized Credit Finance Business Act, large credit card merchants such as Kakao Pay must not demand or receive unfair compensation from VAN companies for using credit card value-added communication services. VAN companies are also prohibited from providing unfair compensation to large credit card merchants.

The police conducted a search and seizure at Kakao Pay headquarters yesterday and secured documents related to the recruitment and management of payment service merchants.

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