Reform Party think tank poll

65.9% disapprove of national pension fund management decisions

The Kospi and won-dollar exchange rate are displayed on screens at the dealing room of Hana Bank's headquarters in Jung-gu, Seoul, on Monday, when the Kospi fell 1.45 percent to close in the 2,400s — its lowest level in about seven months. [Yonhap]
The Kospi and won-dollar exchange rate are displayed on screens at the dealing room of Hana Bank's headquarters in Jung-gu, Seoul, on Monday, when the Kospi fell 1.45 percent to close in the 2,400s — its lowest level in about seven months. [Yonhap]

A new poll shows 66.4 percent of South Koreans view the Lee Jae Myung government's stock market revitalization policies negatively. The survey also found that 76.1 percent of investors who put money into domestic stocks or related exchange-traded funds over the past three months reported losses.

The Reform Institute, a think tank affiliated with the Reform Party, released the findings Tuesday, saying negative assessments of the government's "stock market revitalization policy" outweighed positive ones by 66.4 percent to 28.9 percent.

The survey, conducted Sunday among 1,005 adults aged 18 and older nationwide, found that negative views of the policy exceeded positive ones by 37.5 percentage points.

When asked whether the government had adequately considered investors' risk of losses while pursuing the policy, 70.5 percent responded negatively. Of those, 49.8 percent said the government had "not considered it at all" and 20.7 percent said it had "generally not considered it." Only 24.3 percent said the government had given the matter sufficient consideration.

The government's decision to allow the launch of single-stock leveraged and inverse ETFs and ETNs drew even sharper criticism, with 70.8 percent rating it negatively. Half of all respondents — 50.5 percent — called it a "very wrong decision," while 20.2 percent said it was "generally a wrong decision." Positive assessments reached only 19.2 percent.

Among all respondents, 49.3 percent said they had experienced losses while investing in domestic stocks or stock-related ETFs over the past three months. Excluding the 30.3 percent who said they had not invested recently, the loss rate among the 648 active investors reached 76.1 percent. The Reform Institute added, however, that the figure "includes both unrealized losses from share price declines and realized losses from sales, and does not represent confirmed losses or final returns."

Regarding the national pension fund's decision to raise its target allocation to domestic equities and ease the rebalancing threshold for stock sales, 65.9 percent of all respondents disapproved. The Reform Institute noted that even among those who viewed the government's stock market policies positively, 25.8 percent still disapproved of the national pension fund's management decisions.

Reform Party Acting Chairman Lee Ki-in criticized the government for what he called a double standard. "When share prices were rising, they boasted it was their achievement — now that prices have fallen, they are lecturing investors about risk management," he said. "A government that championed debt-fueled investing as 'leverage' and even allowed single-stock leveraged products has no business now placing all the responsibility on investors."

The survey was conducted as a general social issues poll, not an election poll, and was therefore not subject to reporting requirements under the National Election Survey Deliberation Commission. It surveyed 1,005 men and women aged 18 and older nationwide using an automated response system, with a response rate of 1.365 percent and a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points at the 95 percent confidence level.


raining@heraldcorp.com