Six journalists among eight indicted in South Korea over alleged stock manipulation scheme

Prosecutors said on Wednesday they have indicted eight people, including six business daily journalists, for allegedly manipulating stock prices and pocketing over 9 billion won ($6.19 million) in illicit gains.

The suspects face charges of purchasing low-volume or highly volatile stocks in advance before inflating their prices by publishing favourable news articles and then selling them off, the Seoul Southern District Prosecutors Office said.

Of the suspects, an accountant, an investor and five reporters allegedly reaped 8.55 billion won in illegal profits by writing around 1,800 articles between October 2020 and June last year.

The reporters joined the scheme on the condition of receiving 300,000 won per article, with three of them pocketing a total of approximately 150 million won, 160 million won and 28 million won, respectively, reports Yonhap news agency.

Separately, another reporter was charged with making around 740 million won through 340 articles between October 2022 and July 2024 by abusing his authority to send articles.

"We will respond sternly to acts that disrupt the stock market," the prosecution said, promising to track down and confiscate all criminal proceeds.

Meanwhile, the chief financial regulator said on Wednesday that his agency may draw up more measures to cool the single-stock leveraged exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which have been cited as one of the factors rocking the local stock market.

In a report to parliament, Lee Eog-weon, chairman of the Financial Services Commission (FSC), said it will consider additional measures to dampen demand for recently introduced single-stock ETFs.

Earlier, the FSC unveiled a set of measures, such as a hike in the minimum cash deposit for single-stock leveraged ETF investment, effective Friday.

The government moved up the implementation of the deposit requirement by several weeks to help stabilise the market and protect investors amid heightened market volatility.

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