Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs, 'It's unfortunate that we couldn't solve it in advance' over 'investor leveraged ETF losses'

On the 6th, the ruling and opposition parties fought over the submission of data related to the process of introducing a single-stock leveraged ETF during the National Assembly's Finance and Economic Planning Committee audit of the Ministry of Finance and Economy.

The People's Power Party, which is carrying out an ETF offensive, requested the submission of relevant Blue House meeting minutes, but the Democratic Party of Korea put up a defensive shield, saying that it was not under the jurisdiction of the Finance and Economy Committee.

Rep. Bae Jun-young of the People Power Party, the opposition party's secretary-general, said on this day, "Single-stock leveraged ETFs have caused losses amounting to approximately 54 trillion won to individual investors and greatly damaged the credibility of the financial authorities." He demanded, "Submit preliminary review materials for reporting to the Blue House meeting on January 13 and the President's Office instructions and implementation plan issued to the Ministry of Finance and Economy."

Rep. Park Soo-young of the same party also criticized, "Data requested by the National Assembly must be submitted to the National Assembly unless it is a state secret, such as military, diplomatic, or North Korea relations. However, the Ministry of Finance and Economy's submission of data is very insincere. If they continue to refuse to submit data, strong accusation measures at the level of the Finance and Economy Committee are needed."

Regarding this, Rep. Ki-hyung Oh of the Democratic Party of Korea, a member of the ruling party, countered, saying, "Because it is a government audit of an agency under the jurisdiction of the Finance and Economy Committee, there should be a debate in this regard," adding, "The authority to supervise the financial market and aspects related to financial products should be mainly handled by the Political Affairs Committee."

He added, “Currently, the division of work for Blue House-related meetings is being left to the National Assembly Steering Committee,” and “As the Steering Committee’s National Assembly audit remains, I think (the Blue House meetings) can sufficiently discuss with each other there.”

Meanwhile, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance and Economy Lee Hyeong-il, who attended the National Assembly inspection on this day, expressed his position regarding the losses suffered by individual investors due to single-stock leveraged ETFs, saying, "I think it is unfortunate that we were not able to resolve the large losses suffered by individual investors in advance."