The Korea Herald

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[Newsmaker] Prosecutors raid Seoul bourse on Samsung’s accounting probe

By Jung Min-kyung

Published : March 15, 2019 - 15:35

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Prosecutors raided South Korea’s main bourse on Friday, as part of a probe concerning the accounting fraud by Samsung BioLogics.

Officials of the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office were sent to search the Korea Exchange in western Seoul, officials said.
 
Cameras await prosecutors at the Korea Exchange on Friday. (Yonhap) Cameras await prosecutors at the Korea Exchange on Friday. (Yonhap)

The raid, which reportedly started late Thursday, was part of a probe into Samsung BioLogics, which allegedly violated accounting rules by deliberately overstating the value of affiliate Samsung Bioepis ahead of its initial public offering in 2016.

Investigators suspect that the bourse eased the rules of the IPO process to aid the biopharmaceutical firm’s listing.

In a separate inquiry, the regulator Financial Services Commission estimated that the alleged fraudulent accounting amounts to 4.5 trillion won ($3.96 billion).

By Jung Min-kyung (mkjung@heraldcorp.com)