Divorce Case of SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won: High Court Rules on Asset Division and Compensation
Recently, the Seoul High Court issued a second-instance ruling on the divorce case of SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won.
According to the ruling, Chey Tae-won is required to divide assets worth 1.3808 trillion KRW (approximately 7.2 billion RMB) with his ex-wife Roh Soh-yeong and pay 2 billion KRW as compensation for emotional distress.
Chey Tae-won, 64, is the chairman of SK Group, the third-largest chaebol in South Korea, and ranked 2046th on the 2024 Forbes Global Billionaires List with a fortune of $1.5 billion.
Roh Soh-yeong, 63, the daughter of former South Korean President Roh Tae-woo, currently serves as the director of the NABI Art Center under SK Group.
Following the announcement of the court's second-instance ruling, SK Group's stock price surged by 16%.
Public information shows that Chey Tae-won holds a 17.7% stake in SK Group.
Analysts believe that the rise in SK's stock price may be due to measures taken by Chey Tae-won to artificially drive up the price, thereby satisfying the amount required by the court ruling with a smaller number of shares.
Chey Tae-won and Roh Soh-yeong met and fell in love while studying in the United States.
In 1988, the two married, just as Roh Tae-woo assumed the presidency of South Korea.
The couple has two daughters and one son.
However, at the end of 2015, Chey Tae-won publicly admitted to an extramarital affair and fathering a daughter.
He published a "Confession of an Illegitimate Child" in the media, stating that he had been estranged from Roh Soh-yeong for many years and urged her to divorce him.
According to South Korean media, Chey Tae-won's mistress is Kim Hee-young, chairman of the TNC Foundation, a divorced Korean-American woman with a son.
She and Chey Tae-won have a 6-year-old daughter together.
Reporters revealed that Chey Tae-won allegedly embezzled funds from SK Group subsidiaries to buy property for his mistress and cohabited with her.
Surprisingly, Roh Soh-yeong stated, "It’s all my fault. My husband is the victim.
I failed to understand his emotions and hurt him. I even considered raising Chey Tae-won's illegitimate daughter myself."
This statement shocked the public.
In 2015, South Korea abolished the "Anti-Adultery Law," meaning Chey Tae-won would not face legal consequences for his infidelity.
For Roh Soh-yeong, who had no power or shares in SK Group, divorce would mean leaving empty-handed.
Therefore, she chose to endure.
In 2017, Chey Tae-won filed for divorce again, but Roh Soh-yeong still refused, leading to a "divorce tug-of-war."
Two years later, in late 2019, Roh Soh-yeong proactively filed for divorce.
Over these four years, Roh Soh-yeong not only understood Chey Tae-won's asset situation but also managed to get their three children into SK Group.
Their eldest daughter, Yoon-jeong Choi, joined SK Biopharmaceuticals in 2017 and became an executive in the group.
Their second daughter, Min-jeong Choi, gained work experience after serving in the South Korean Navy and joined SK’s international trade management department in 2019.
Their youngest son, Yoon-jin Choi, joined SK Clean Energy in 2018 after graduating from Brown University.
In 2022, Chey Tae-won and Roh Soh-yeong officially divorced.
The first-instance ruling by the South Korean court required Chey Tae-won to divide 66.5 billion KRW in assets and pay 1 billion KRW in compensation.
Roh Soh-yeong was dissatisfied and appealed, seeking 2 trillion KRW in assets.
The appellate court acknowledged that Roh Tae-woo had supported the business activities of Chey Tae-won's father, the late former chairman of SK Group, Chey Jong-hyun, providing intangible support to SK Group's operations.
Therefore, Roh Soh-yeong was deemed to have contributed to SK Group's value and business activities, making Chey Tae-won's entire assets subject to division.
This ruling set a record for the highest asset division amount in a South Korean divorce case.
Additionally, the appellate court noted that Chey Tae-won did not show sincere remorse for his marital infidelity during the divorce process, nor did he demonstrate respect for monogamy.
The court recognized that Chey Tae-won maintained a "de facto marriage" with Kim Hee-young during the marriage and spent over 21.9 billion KRW on her, providing her with "immeasurable financial benefits," thus deeming the initial emotional distress compensation too low.
Roh Soh-yeong's father, Roh Tae-woo, had been investigated for corruption issues.
On December 18, 1995, Roh Tae-woo became the first former president in South Korean history to be publicly tried;
In August 1996, he was sentenced to 22.5 years in prison but was pardoned and released by then-President Kim Dae-jung in early 1998.
South Korean society widely believes that Roh Tae-woo used his influence directly and indirectly to help SK Group enter the telecommunications field before leaving office in 1993, which provided significant support for SK Group's growth.
In summary, this divorce case not only involves a substantial division of assets and emotional compensation but also reveals the complex internal relationships within South Korean chaebol families and the intertwined history of power and money.
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