Among the 2,047 asset disclosure subjects, including senior public officials and members of the National Assembly, many are found to hold overseas big tech stocks. Among them, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Finance Choi Sang-mok reported assets including government bonds and U.S. bonds, having invested nearly 200 million won in 30-year U.S. bonds last year. National Assembly member Ahn Cheol-soo showed an investment pattern in relatively safe assets, such as a massive purchase of public corporation bonds.
On the 27th, the Government Officials Ethics Committee released an asset disclosure status of public officials as of the end of 2024, indicating that many senior public officials have seen their wealth surge thanks to U.S. tech stocks like Nvidia and TSMC.
Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon sold bond assets including Brazilian government bonds last year and acquired 1,100 shares of Nvidia and 1,241 shares of MicroStrategy, causing the value of his held stocks to skyrocket from 1.55 million won to 1.05191 billion won. The U.S. software company MicroStrategy is well known for its Bitcoin (BTC) investment.
It appears that the preference for stocks among senior public officials, including those from the Financial Services Commission, the Financial Supervisory Service, and the Industrial Bank, remains strong. Choi Won-mok, the president of the Korea Credit Guarantee Fund, holds a significant amount of U.S. big tech stocks, including 340 shares of Amazon, 154 shares of Alphabet A, 475 shares of Apple, and 1,600 shares of Nvidia. His children also hold U.S. stocks, including Grab Holdings, Block, Tesla, Palantir Technologies A, and HIMS.
Kang Seok-hoon, the president of the Industrial Bank, reported a stockholding amount of approximately 129.04 million won when combining his shares with his spouse’s. He holds 5,000 shares of Asia Web, 10,000 shares of SK REIT, 3,846 shares of Macquarie Korea Infrastructure, along with 60 shares of Merck, 70 shares of Nvidia, 20 shares of Microsoft, and 8 shares of Eli Lilly.
In the legal field, Minister Park Sung-jae sold all domestic stocks, while Prosecutor General Sim Woo-jung's family aggressively purchased U.S. stocks. Minister Park sold stocks of major domestic IT and tech companies such as Samsung Electronics, LG Energy Solution, Naver, Kakao, BGF, and KRAFTON. Seoul Central District Prosecutor Lee Chang-soo also disposed of all his shares in Samsung Electronics and Celltrion Healthcare.
In contrast, the family of Prosecutor General Sim actively invested in overseas big tech stocks. Sim's spouse holds 2,382 shares of TSMC, 1,442 shares of Microsoft, 235 shares of MicroStrategy, 1,336 shares of Amazon, and 3,174 shares of Nvidia, with the value of their tech-heavy portfolio having more than doubled from 2.1 billion won to 4.6 billion won.
Jang Yong-sung, a member of the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of Korea, also holds a significant amount of U.S. big tech stocks over the long term, surpassing 10 billion won in asset value. Before his appointment to the committee, Commissioner Jang held a considerable number of shares in overseas big tech companies, including 3,700 shares of Amazon and 5,260 shares of Alphabet A. The total value of the overseas stocks held by him and his spouse increased by more than 1.5 billion won last year, reaching about 4.2 billion won.
There were also public officials focusing on bond investments, evaluated as safe assets. Ahn, who holds an overwhelming asset of 136.7 billion won, reported 1.86 million shares of AhnLab and 6.4 billion won in corporate bonds. He sold approximately 2.9 billion won in government bonds and has reportedly bought bonds from public enterprises such as Korea Southern Power and Korea Ocean Business Corporation.
Deputy Prime Minister Choi holds government bonds worth 240 million won in his name and 200 million won in his spouse's name. He notably invested 197.12 million won last year in another bond (T1.37508/15/50). This bond was identified as a 30-year U.S. bond.
Choi Ji-young, the top official at the Ministry of Economy and Finance, reported an asset of 4.10904 billion won as of the end of last year. Among these, stocks in the name of his spouse account for the largest share at 3.63445 billion won. The vice minister's spouse holds unlisted shares of Jeil Construction, a construction company in the Honam region, amounting to 23,748 shares of Jeil Pungkyungchae and 200,000 shares of Pungkyungchae.
Ryu Kwang-joon, the head of the Ministry of Science and ICT's Science and Technology Innovation Office, reported holding 1.79 million shares of Heungkuk, a family company, under his name, his spouse's name, and his eldest son and daughter's names, totaling securities worth 10.3841 billion won. Han Ki-jeong, Chairman of the Fair Trade Commission, reported approximately 24.84 million won in stocks and bonds under his name (1,100 shares of Central Insight) and his spouse's name (15 shares of Kohap).