S.Korea Prosecutors looking into Deutsche Bank’s involvement in stock market plunge

South Korea Prosecutor said Wednesday that they are looking into the local unit of Deutsche Bank in connection with last November’s stock market fall, amid the local financial regulator’s ongoing investigation over its alleged market manipulation or unfair stock transactions.

The prosecutor’s move comes after financial regulators said yesterday that they will announce the results of the inspection later this month.

Deutsche Bank’s local branch, located in Honkong or etc., has been investigated by Korean government watchdog, Financial Services Commission (FSC) over its massive stock trading or orders that resulted in much fall in the country’s KOSPI index by 2.7 percent on November 11 (option expiry day), which is driven by arbitrage trading between the spot and future stocks.

During these 10 minutes of last trading, 2.4 trillion won ($2.16 billion) in sell orders from Deutsche Bank related foreign investor’s accounts were processed.

“The FSC has not yet finished and submitted a complaint for a prosecutor’s investigation, but we are looking into the matter which seems questionable,” said an official at the Seoul Central Prosecutors’ Office, quoted as saying to Yonhap news agency.

(아주경제 송지영 기자)

Park Sae-jin swatchsjp@ajunews.com