South Korea toughens regulations on single-stock leveraged ETFs

SEOUL, July 16 : South Korea's financial regulator on Thursday unveiled a series of regulatory measures aimed at easing market volatility triggered by exchange-traded funds (ETFs) that are tied to certain major technology firms. So-called single-stock, leveraged ETFs linked to chipmakers Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix were first introduced in South Korea in late May amid a chipmaker-driven rally in the country's KOSPI stock benchmark. But the derivative-based funds have increased market volatility. "Recently, various worries and the needs of improvements have been raised about further increases in already heightened volatility in major memory chipmaker stocks globally and a high possibility of increasing investor losses," the Financial Services Commission (FSC) said in a statement.The FS