South Korean broker redefines fat-fingered trading

Samsung Securities Co

10/04/2018 04:17

(The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions
expressed are his own.)
    By Jeffrey Goldfarb
    HONG KONG, April 10 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Samsung
Securities is reeling after clumsily issuing 2.8 bln shares to
staff instead of 2.8 bln won in dividends. Worse, some employees
swiftly offloaded the stock. Big clients are fleeing and
regulators arriving. It's about as painful a way there is to
erode trust in finance.  

    Full view will be published shortly.
    On Twitter https://twitter.com/jgfarb
    
    CONTEXT NEWS
    - South Korea's biggest retirement fund, the National
Pension Service, said on April 10 it had stopped trading stocks
through Samsung Securities after the brokerage mistakenly issued
shares to its employees.
    - The country's Financial Supervisory Service also said on
April 9 it would begin a probe in the "overall stock markets
system," after some Samsung Securities employees sold the stock.
    - Instead of issuing 2.8 billion won worth of dividends to
employees under a stock ownership plan, the Korean brokerage
erroneously issued 2.8 billion shares in the company worth 110
trillion won.
    - The brokerage said that 16 workers sold about 5 million of
the shares, the Korea Times reported.
    - For previous columns by the author, Reuters customers can
click on  GOLDFARB/  
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    <^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
S.Korea to begin industry-wide probe after Samsung Securities
error     urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL3N1RM1S9
South Korean pension fund stops trading with Samsung Securities
after fat finger error     urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL3N1RN02K
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 (Editing by Rob Cox and Katrina Hamlin)
 ((jeffrey.goldfarb@thomsonreuters.com; Reuters Messaging:
jeffrey.goldfarb.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))