Fahmi Quadir, a world-renowned short seller known on Wall Street as an assassin, is making a surprise entry into the South Korean market.
A specialist in short selling—betting on stock price declines by uncovering corporate weaknesses and corruption—Quadir has transformed into an activist investor who generates profit by directly boosting corporate value, and she has chosen South Korea as her investment stage.
Quadir is the figure who earned massive profits through short selling by persistently uncovering accounting fraud at global pharmaceutical company Valeant and German fintech firm Wirecard.
Quadir's story was also featured in the Netflix documentary series Dirty Money.
However, according to The Wall Street Journal, Quadir has recently liquidated her existing hedge fund.
Instead, she plans to open an office in Seoul and hire local staff.
In fact, Quadir has already begun full-scale analysis of South Korean companies, starting her data analysis as early as 2:00 a.m.
The key appeal of the South Korean market identified by Quadir is the extreme undervaluation, known as the Korea Discount, relative to the country's outstanding technological capabilities.
Quadir told The Wall Street Journal, "More than two-thirds of KOSPI-listed companies are trading below their book value," adding, "I will now use the same persistent analytical skills I used for short selling to improve corporate governance, such as through share buybacks and cancellations and strengthening board independence."
In particular, her strategy is to target small and medium-sized enterprises with significant room for governance improvement, aligning with policy changes such as the Value-up Program recently pushed by the government.
Previously, Cathie Wood, CEO of ARK Invest, who is often called the Ark Mother for her investments in innovative companies like Tesla, also highly valued the South Korean market, calling Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix the "heart and soul of the AI revolution."
Although the South Korean stock market has been experiencing a sharp decline with repeated plunges, there are projections that the successive moves by global big players could serve as a new stepping stone for market recovery.
Reported by Lee Hyeon-yeong | Video by Seo Byeong-uk | Graphics by Lee Su-min | Produced by SBS Digital News
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