South Korea Fines 15 Firms $1.2 Billion for Government Bond Auction Collusion

By Kwanwoo Jun

South Korea's antitrust regulator　has fined 15 domestic financial companies approximately $1.21 billion in total for colluding in government bond auctions.

The Korea Fair Trade Commission imposed a total fine of 1.627 trillion won on five banks and 10 brokerage firms, it said in a statement Wednesday.

A yearlong investigation found that the primary dealers colluded across 145 South Korean auctions between January 2020 and June 2023, by sharing information or coordinating bid yields or volumes to unfairly lower yields, the commission said.

The watchdog said the actions constituted a serious legal violation that effectively nullified the competitive bidding system and caused losses to the national treasury by restricting fair competition.

The regulator also said that it would file complaints with prosecutors against seven financial firms, citing their relatively longer and more frequent involvement in the collusion.

The companies facing complaints include KB Securities, NH Investment & Securities and Mirae Asset Securities, which received some of the largest fines at 332.18 billion won, 242.79 billion won and 214.83 billion won, respectively.

Officials at KB and Mirae didn't immediately respond to requests for comment, while NH declined to comment.

The combined fines imposed on the financial firms surpass the previous record of 747.6 billion won levied on local starch makers earlier this year, the commission said.

The regulator said it expects this latest move against alleged collusions to promote greater competition in government bond auctions--a market typically characterized by high barriers to entry--and improve public debt management.

Write to Kwanwoo Jun at kwanwoo.jun@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

November 11, 2026 02:04 ET (07:04 GMT)