13 ordered to pay 4.7B won over ‘fat-finger’ scandal

Thirteen employees at Samsung Securities who attempted to exploit an erroneous trading order made from an inputting error at the brokerage are required to provide 4.7 billion won ($4 million) in compensation to the company, a court ruled on Wednesday.

The Seoul Central District Court demanded that the employees pay half of the damage claimed by the securities company since they caused the losses by selling the so-called ghost stocks mistakenly issued due to a keyword inputting error last year in an event dubbed the “fat-finger' scandal.

Samsung Securities claimed that it had to spend 9.4 billion won in the process of securing the shares and covering losses, requesting 9.4 billion won in compensation. The court accepted half of the claim.

The accused said that they sold the shares out of curiosity, but the court didn’t accept that defense.

On April 6 last year, an employee at Samsung Securities made an inputting error. Instead of sending 2,018 employees of the company 1,000 won in dividends for the shares they held in the company, they were sent 1,000 shares for every share they owned.

Samsung Securities warned employees not to sell the shares, but 16 employees sold 5.01 million shares valued at 182 billion won.

As a result, the price of Samsung Securities shares fell sharply, with the total trading volume increasing to 13 million shares, 26 times larger than the previous day. Shares closed that day 3.02 percent lower than the previous day.

BY PARK EUN-JEE [park.eunjee@joongang.co.kr]