▲ Lee Eog-weon, chairman of the Financial Services Commission, speaks during a press briefing in Seoul on May 21, 2026. (Yonhap)

chief regulator-foreign omnibus accounts

Offshore retail investors to be allowed ETF trading via omnibus accounts: chief regulator

SEOUL, May 21 (Yonhap) -- The chief of the country's financial regulator said Thursday his agency will soon revise regulations for offshore retail investors so they can buy and sell exchange-traded funds (ETFs) via so-called omnibus accounts, a move aimed at attracting more foreign capital into the domestic stock market.

Currently, foreign investors are only allowed to trade Korean stocks directly via omnibus accounts without opening separate accounts with Korean brokerages.

"Foreign investors are sending love calls to buy Korean stocks, but there is still something to be done (for their trading)," Lee Eog-weon, chairman of the Financial Services Commission (FSC), said in a press briefing.

The scheme was first introduced in 2017, but foreign retail investors' access to the local stock market has been limited due to regulatory barriers and complicated account-opening procedures.

In contrast, Korean retail investors have been pouring a large amount of money to buy overseas stocks.

The FSC chief said guidelines on the banning of so-called "split listing" will be revealed by early June.

Split listing, also referred to as duplicate listing, occurs when a core business division is spun off and listed separately, and has long been cited as one of the major reasons behind the so-called "Korea discount."

The listing practice has long undermined shareholder value, and the regulator has been seeking to "in principle" ban the practice.

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