As President Lee Jae-myung stepped up direct communication through social media (SNS), the financial authorities set up an emergency response system. As the president's SNS posts effectively served as policy guidelines, the Financial Services Commission significantly simplified reporting procedures and set up a real-time monitoring team for rapid response.
According to the financial authorities on the 18th, the Financial Services Commission has been operating a "presidential X (formerly Twitter) response team" since early last month to quickly respond to the president's SNS posts. The response team is not a formal unit but a task force composed of the Spokesperson's office Head of Team and working-level Deputy Directors. They set real-time alerts on the president's X account and immediately check any new posts not only during working hours but also after work and on weekends.
The response procedure has been drastically shortened compared with before. When the president mentions finance-related matters, the response team is activated immediately and relays the content to the relevant bureaus and offices to determine whether a statement is needed. If an urgent response is deemed necessary, they draft a position paper and report it in the executives' group chat. Because it usually takes less than five minutes from activating the response team to reporting in the chat, it is also called the "five-minute standby unit."
The Financial Services Commission established this response system after President Lee repeatedly mentioned through the X account last month a policy of not extending loans for owners of multiple homes. Under the previous method, if a post went up after work, a Deputy Director would check it the next morning and it would be reported through the Director and Director General to the Chairperson, taking more than half a day. In the meantime, if a new message from the president appeared, the timing for response could be missed.
Inside the Financial Services Commission, there is an assessment that policy response efficiency has greatly improved since the response team was activated. This is because, as executives share the situation in real time, follow-up measures such as immediate distribution of explanatory materials or convening working-level meetings are carried out in the shortest possible time.
An official at the Financial Services Commission said, "The president's SNS has such reach and speed that it is impossible to respond using the conventional reporting routine," and added, "Since switching to a system that shares information flexibly and quickly, we have seen the effect of reducing policy confusion."