Jung Il-mun, chief executive officer of Korea Investment & Securities Co., was the highest-paid individual in the brokerage industry in South Korea, who took home 5.52 billion won ($429.7 million), despite the sluggish stock market.

According to data from the Financial Supervisory Service on Thursday, Jung received 5.52 billion won in paycheck in 2022. He was considered the highest-paid individual earlier on as he was paid 5.1 billion won in the first six months of the year.

“A large part of Jung’s paycheck was the deferred bonuses, in addition to the bonus from the year 2021 when the company posted the industry’s record net profit of 1.5 trillion won,” said an unnamed official from the Korea Investment & Securities.

Mirae Asset Securities Co. Chairman Choi Hyun-man was the second-highest paid individual with 5.1 billion won in paycheck last year.

Meritz Securities Vice Chairman Choi Hi-moon was paid 3.7 billion won, NH Investment & Securities Co. President Jeong Young-chae 2.48 billion won, and Samsung Securities Co. President Chang Seok-hoon 1.9 billion won last year.

The highest paid staff member was a private banking specialist at Samsung Securities who received 3.65 billion won in bonuses last year on top of 74 million won in annual salary.

The top five most-paid workers at major brokerage houses in Korea were in charge of real estate project financing and retail. The average annual salary of a brokerage employee surpassed 100 million won. Meritz Securities was the highest-paying employer, with the average salary of employees topping 200 million won for two years in a row, followed by NH Investment & Securities (175 million won), Korea Investment & Securities (160 million won), and Mirae Asset Securities (141 million won).

By Park Yoon-yea and Chang Iou-chung

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