When a corporate group provides funds, assets, personnel, goods, or services to its affiliates, unfair support practices (unfair internal transactions) can arise. Unfair internal transactions are considered violations of the Fair Trade Act when there is a comparison with normal prices and unfairness is acknowledged, leading to potential criminal penalties, corrective orders, and other sanctions. Internal transactions between affiliated companies are not inherently illegal. Therefore, a thorough legal review is necessary to prevent potential legal issues from the pre-transaction stage if investigations on unfair internal transactions (unfair support practices) from the KFTC are to be avoided and to ensure that transactions between affiliated companies are conducted within a legitimate framework. Additionally, it is essential to establish management systems for continuous monitoring to ensure that transactions between affiliated companies are conducted in a legal manner.
Recently, the KFTC has been expanding the scope of regulation and supervision of unfair internal transactions, which were primarily problematic in large corporate groups, to include mid-sized companies. Kim & Kim provides comprehensive advice on internal transactions based on rich experience ranging from internal transaction inspections and responses to Fair Trade Commission investigations to administrative litigation.
We provide comprehensive advice on the assessment of whether unfair support to related parties or affiliates, such as so-called “tunneling”, as well as advice on various disclosure obligations and KFTC investigations and sanctions.
When a corporate group provides funds, assets, personnel, goods, or services to its affiliates, unfair support practices (unfair internal transactions) can arise. Unfair internal transactions are considered violations of the Fair Trade Act when there is a comparison with normal prices and unfairness is acknowledged, leading to potential criminal penalties, corrective orders, and other sanctions. Internal transactions between affiliated companies are not inherently illegal. Therefore, a thorough legal review is necessary to prevent potential legal issues from the pre-transaction stage if investigations on unfair internal transactions (unfair support practices) from the KFTC are to be avoided and to ensure that transactions between affiliated companies are conducted within a legitimate framework. Additionally, it is essential to establish management systems for continuous monitoring to ensure that transactions between affiliated companies are conducted in a legal manner.
Recently, the KFTC has been expanding the scope of regulation and supervision of unfair internal transactions, which were primarily problematic in large corporate groups, to include mid-sized companies. Kim & Kim provides comprehensive advice on internal transactions based on rich experience ranging from internal transaction inspections and responses to Fair Trade Commission investigations to administrative litigation.
We provide comprehensive advice on the assessment of whether unfair support to related parties or affiliates, such as so-called “tunneling”, as well as advice on various disclosure obligations and KFTC investigations and sanctions.