World Cup Victory for Spain.

• In the 106th minute of extra time, Fernando Torres sealed the win with a decisive goal, defeating defending champions Argentina 1:0.
• It was a marquee clash between the top two teams in the FIFA rankings.
• Sunday’s 3rd-4th place playoff saw England and France battle in a wild 6:4 thriller, with momentum swinging back and forth.
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Kim Yong-beom’s Apology.

• Appearing on KBS, he said, “I am sorry to many citizens.” This was in response to the simultaneous surge in home prices, jeonse (lump-sum deposits), and monthly rents.
• Ko Jong-wan (Director of the Korea Asset Management Research Institute) stated, “Panic buying reminiscent of the Moon Jae-in administration is resurfacing, especially in outlying areas.”
• Lee Chang-mu (Professor at Hanyang University) added, “The government’s excessive regulations have also amplified market participants’ anxiety” and emphasized, “Policy priorities should focus on stabilizing the jeonse and monthly rental markets and securing housing stability for ordinary citizens.”
• Kim Yong-beom explained, “We could allow sales at appropriate times, and if that period passes, gradually increase the burden.”
• In an editorial, the JoongAng Ilbo criticized, “It is problematic to unilaterally and punitively increase property tax burdens without an exit strategy.” It warned, “This could trigger strong tax resistance, tax shifting, and exacerbate market stagnation due to withheld listings.”
• Related Link.
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Leveraged Listings Cannot Be Abolished.

• “Because these are already introduced products with investors committed, and the market for these instruments has already exceeded 10 trillion won.”
• First, delisting is possible if a fund’s net asset value falls below 5 billion won or if the underlying asset is delisted—but neither applies here.
• Second, there is an exceptional clause allowing the exchange to delist for public interest or investor protection, but the criteria are vague and it has never been applied in practice.
• Third, forcing delisting could flood the market with sudden sell-offs, exacerbating shocks, and force already-loss-making investors to liquidate at inopportune times.
• Delisting alone won’t solve the issue in the Korean market. SK Hynix’s leveraged ETF, listed in Hong Kong, has net assets of $6.6 billion, and Samsung Electronics’ leveraged ETF stands at $1.8 billion. This shows foreign markets already host larger leveraged ETFs than Korea’s. Kim Hak-gyun (Shinyoung Securities Research Center Director) said, “Since the issue stems from a structural problem where specific stocks’ influence has expanded beyond expectations, domestic leveraged product regulations alone will struggle to reduce volatility.”
• Related Link.

What Matters Now.

Coupang Incheon Logistics Center Fire.

• 18일 오전 7시쯤 난 불이 아직 꺼지지 않고 있다. 월요일 오전 7시 기준으로 48시간이 지난 상태다.
• The fire that broke out around 7:00 AM on the 18th has yet to be fully extinguished. As of 7:00 AM Monday, 48 hours have passed.
• 근무시간이 아니어서 인명 피해는 없었다.
• No casualties were reported as it was outside working hours.
• 2021년 쿠팡 이천 물류센터 화재는 132시간 만에 꺼졌다. 지난해 11월 이랜드 천안 물류센터 화재는 진화에 60시간이 걸렸다.
• The 2021 Coupang Icheon logistics center fire took 132 hours to extinguish. The November 2022 E-Land Cheonan logistics center fire required 60 hours to control.
• 층과 층 사이에 선반을 설치해 중간 층을 두는 메자닌 구조라 화재에 취약하고 가연성 물질이 많아 초기 진화가 어려웠다. 건물 붕괴 가능성이 있어 인근 주민들이 대피한 상태다.
• The mezzanine structure—with intermediate floors created by installing shelves between levels—is fire-prone and difficult to control early due to abundant flammable materials. Residents nearby have evacuated due to potential building collapse risks.

Public Opinion Favors Retaining “Supplementary Investigative Authority” at 61%.

• Results from a Gallup Korea poll. Only 23% supported full abolition.
• Among Democratic Party supporters, 46% favored retention vs. 39% for abolition.
• People Power Party supporters showed 81% for retention vs. 8% for abolition.
• When asked about the establishment of the new anti-corruption agency in September last year, approval stood at 51%. Gallup Korea noted, “The public is not as actively supportive as it was then.”

Controversy Surrounding Song Young-gil’s Candidacy.

• Democratic Party bylaws stipulate that one must pay party dues at least six times a year to run for party leader.
• Song Young-gil (former Democratic Party leader) and Kim Yong (former deputy director of the Democratic Research Institute) both fail to meet the criteria. Song returned to the party four months ago, and Kim claims he couldn’t pay dues due to frozen accounts.
• The Democratic Party’s Supreme Council hastily convened a meeting to grant them an exception. The logic: “Time stolen by prosecutors cannot be a disqualifying factor.”
• Park Ji-won (Democratic Party Supreme Council member) criticized, “I worry this sends a signal that the Democratic Party is not so different from judicial corrupt forces,” adding, “I fear today may become a day of disgrace.” Park Gyu-hwan (Democratic Party Supreme Council member) stated, “I am ashamed to have been present here.”
• Four years ago, the Democratic Party ruled that Park Ji-hyun (then emergency committee chairperson) was ineligible to run for party leader because she hadn’t met the six-month membership requirement. Park Ji-hyun posted on Facebook, “Today is the day the Democratic Party officially declared itself an unfair party—saying youth are unfit, but 686s are acceptable.”
• Related Link.
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Rep. Jung Cheong-rae Keeps Conceding.

• He accepted the preferential voting system and stepped aside for Song Young-gil’s candidacy. Chosun Ilbo noted, “From Rep. Jung Cheong-rae’s (former Democratic Party leader) perspective, it would be advantageous to block Song Young-gil.”
• A pro-Moon faction lawmaker said, “He’s playing a political game, pretending to be a ‘big-hearted magnanimous figure’ to collect sympathy votes.”
• In reality, Rep. Jung’s support base is rallying.
• A Democratic Party lawmaker remarked, “Given his usual style, he should have pushed back aggressively, but it seems someone meticulously scripted a narrative casting him as a victim and underdog.” Analysis suggests Rep. Jung and his allies are dividing roles as ‘good cops’ and ‘bad cops’ to advance an underdog strategy.
• Related Link.

Deep Dive.

Semiconductor Peak-Out Fears.

• SK Hynix ADS, listed on the Nasdaq, plummeted 13.7% last Friday, a constitutional holiday in South Korea. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index fell 4.3%.
• TSMC dropped 7.3% despite an earnings surprise.
• Japan’s Kioxia also crashed 16.1%.
• Yuanta Securities analyzed, “To confirm a peak in memory profits, four factors must be verified: reduced big tech investment, decline in long-term HBM contracts, slowing server DRAM price growth, and decreased next-gen GPU orders. None have materialized.”

The Memory Paradox.

• Importing countries face cost-push inflation, while exporting countries experience demand-pull inflation.
• Memory chips, software, and electricity rates are all rising. Goldman Sachs analyzed that AI-related factors have increased U.S. inflation by 0.2 percentage points and could reach 0.5 percentage points by year-end.
• In South Korea, corporate profits are driving demand-pull inflation, stimulating wages, consumption, services, and prices. Shin Hyun-song (Bank of Korea Governor) noted, “The 13.2% increase in gross national income stems from higher prices, not export volumes.”
• Related Link.

Kimi K3 Shock.

• Kimi K3, released by Chinese AI startup MoonShot AI, scored on par with GPT-5.6 Sol and Claude Fabulous 5. Some benchmarks even show it leading.
• Analyses suggest the gap has narrowed to two months.
• K3’s cost is $3 for 1 million tokens of input—roughly half that of GPT-5.6 Sol.
• It has 2.8 trillion parameters. As an open-weight AI model, anyone can download and modify it.
• Critics question whether its benchmark scores were optimized for favorable results. Suspicions also arise that it copies U.S. frontier models.
• Choi Byung-ho (Korea University professor) said, “While Chinese AI hasn’t yet surpassed U.S. advanced AI, it’s concentrating capabilities, so it’s likely only a matter of time.”
• Related Link.

Can the Fallout from Abolishing Supplementary Investigative Authority Be Managed?

• “If supplementary investigative authority is abolished and police incompetence is exposed, the government and ruling party cannot escape responsibility,” a Democratic Party lawmaker told JoongAng Ilbo, warning, “Each misstep will return as a boomerang in the next general election.”
• In an editorial, Chosun Ilbo criticized, “The current reality of the Democratic Party is that major issues of national judicial system reform—directly tied to citizens’ lives—are being sacrificed to partisan battles and vote calculations.”
• Kang Cheon-seok (Chosun Ilbo advisor) condemned, “Abolishing supplementary investigative authority—concentrating both intelligence and investigative power in the police while ignoring the principle of mutual checks between power institutions—is no different from democratic suicide.”
• Lee Hyeon-sang (JoongAng Ilbo columnist) noted, “Avoiding simple solutions for complex ones only complicates the problem,” adding, “Prosecutorial reform driven by blind hostility, detached from public sentiment, is nothing more than a dangerous ‘blood feud of vengeance.’”
• Related Link.
• Related Link.
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Another Take.

Choi Tae-won Warns of Triple Headwinds.

• Choi Tae-won (SK Chairman) spoke at a Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry forum.
• “If chipflation worsens, we’ll inevitably face backlash,” he said, arguing, “Even if margins shrink, we must expand supply to grow the market.”
• “Focusing solely on raising prices risks three headwinds: shrinking markets, new competitors, and geopolitical pushback.”
• “Next year’s AI semiconductor demand is projected to surge 60–100% from this year, but supply barely grows. Chaos severe enough to warrant the term ‘hellish’ is feared. Beyond Yongin and Honam, we must build U.S. factories if possible.”
• Related Link.

“No One Expected to Profit This Much.”.

• Choi Tae-won’s remark amid the performance bonus debate. “If employee happiness infringes on stakeholders’ interests, the system must be revised for sustainability,” he said.
• He dismissed Kim Young-hoon (Minister of Employment and Labor)’s proposal for solidarity wages, stating, “The concept is still unclear—exactly what and how it would be implemented.”
• He admitted accelerating the Yongin cluster completion timeline by 12 years is no easy feat. “Twelve years sounds neat, but the key question is whether we can even digest it internally,” he said, adding, “Solving water, power, and the Serious Accident Punishment Act issues is essential.”

“Excessive Semiconductor Concentration Could Trigger Dutch Disease.”.

• Semiconductors account for 18.8% of industrial production but only 2.6% of employment.
• 60% of semiconductor manufacturing equipment is imported.
• Dutch Disease refers to a phenomenon where excessive concentration of money and talent in a single industry weakens other key sectors. The Netherlands discovered North Sea natural gas, but while the gas industry boomed, the competitiveness of manufacturing and other sectors sharply declined.
• The Bank of Korea warned, “If liquidity from the semiconductor boom flows into non-productive asset markets like real estate rather than productive equipment investment, it could exacerbate financial imbalances.” It emphasized, “The semiconductor industry’s gains must spread to domestic materials, components, and equipment (so-called ‘sobujang’) firms and the broader manufacturing sector by strengthening industrial ecosystem linkages.”
• Related Link.
• Related Link.

Global Oil Prices Are in Beijing’s Hands.

• Even a slowdown in Chinese crude imports can reduce upward pressure on oil prices. When imports increase, prices begin to rise.
• China’s monthly crude imports fell from 810 million barrels per day pre-war to around 600 million barrels post-war. Customs data shows imports are one-third lower than a year ago.
• Karen Young (Senior Researcher, Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy) said, “The direction of Chinese demand is the most critical piece of the puzzle.”
• Gregory Brew (Eurasia Group Analyst) stated, “China exerts greater market dominance than any other country on Earth, including Saudi Arabia and the U.S.”
• Related Link.

Two U.S. Troops Killed, Trump’s Dilemma.

• Strong retaliation would lead to a protracted conflict. Limited response is also untenable. Assessments suggest a strategic trap.
• U.S. gasoline prices have risen to $3.99 per gallon. Public sentiment is also deteriorating. An Ipsos poll showed only 37% support military airstrikes.

Why Google Timeline Evidence Was Not Accepted.

• Kim Yong (former Vice President of the Democratic Research Institute) submitted Google Timeline as evidence in his trial, but it was not accepted.
• Lee Jae-myung (President) criticized, “It is hard to understand that Google Timeline, which has been used as evidence of guilt in court, cannot be evidence of innocence in a specific case,” calling it a “bizarre conclusion.”
• Chosun Ilbo conducted a fact-check. In past trials, there are many cases where Google Timeline was not accepted as an alibi.
• The court ruled, “Google Timeline records the location of a smartphone, not a person’s actual movements, and can be added to or modified after the fact.”
• Cases where Google Timeline was accepted as evidence involved the simultaneous presentation of other objective materials.
• In a lawsuit filed by the family of a worker who died from overwork, the court recognized working hours when Google Timeline was submitted alongside work logs and task records.
• The point is that Google Timeline cannot be the sole evidence.
• Related Link.
• Related Link.

The Fix.

“The Opportunity to Become Parents” Was Not Equal.

• While the birth rate appears to have rebounded, a closer look at the data shows it is concentrated among economically stable individuals in their 30s. Kyunghyang Shinmun noted, “It is closer to a temporary rebound without structural change.”
• According to the Presidential Committee on Aging Society and Population Policies, those who led the post-2024 birth rate rebound were already married, relatively affluent individuals in their 30s.
• The total fertility rate for the top 30% income group rose from 0.84 in 2023 to 0.95 in 2025, while the bottom 30% saw only a reduction in the rate of decline.
• The gap in marriage leads to a gap in childbirth. The married rate among low-income individuals aged 35–39 continues to fall, while it remains stable in higher-income groups. The birth rate among married women in their 30s slightly increased, but it fell in other age groups.
• Yoo Hye-jeong (Director, Center for Population Research, Korea Institute for Future Population) pointed out, “Focusing solely on childbirth support makes it difficult to attract young people to the prerequisite step of marriage,” adding, “Marriage and childbirth support must be designed together.”
• Lee Sang-lim (Senior Researcher, Seoul National University Population Policy Research Center) said, “Without changing job, housing, and education structures together, it is difficult to sustain the current rebound as a lasting change.”
• Related Link.

Five Countries, Including South Korea, Without Mifepristone.

• Out of 36 OECD member states, 33 countries (87%) sell it—excluding South Korea, Turkey, Slovakia, Costa Rica, and Poland.
• Mifepristone is an oral abortion medication. It is permitted in 101 countries worldwide.

Europe Must Now Embrace Air Conditioning.

• It wasn’t a matter of belief but of necessity.
• The situation has changed. Last month, Paris reached 40.9°C, and Vienna hit 40.0°C.
• The Financial Times noted, “Cooling protects productivity and lives,” adding, “It is not a luxury but a necessity.”
• Does air conditioning accelerate global warming? The Financial Times analyzed that it depends on the energy source. If refrigerant-free systems are used and electricity is generated from renewable energy, cooling is possible without fossil fuels.
• Related Link.

A Single Ice Cream Theft Can Make a Juvenile Delinquent.

• Crime is crime. Theft is the most common charge among juvenile delinquents, with 10,110 cases last year—nearly double the number from five years ago.
• Park Sun-young (Professor, Hansei University) noted, “While juvenile delinquency has increased, a significant portion involves new types of crimes like theft from unmanned stores or e-scooter violations, which arise as society changes and children are more exposed to criminal environments.”
• Jeong Hyeon-hyeon (Attorney) explained, “The rise in juvenile delinquency cases reflects society’s dwindling tolerance for children.”
• Experts in the social dialogue committee recommended, “Lowering the age threshold alone is unlikely to prevent crime or aid rehabilitation,” urging “cautious review of age reduction.”
• Lee Jae-myung (President) questioned the proposal to lower the juvenile delinquency age from 14 to 13, asking, “Isn’t this too weak?”
• Park Soo-jin (Team Leader, Hankyoreh Social Policy and Gender) criticized, “A single word from the president could make it all ‘moot.’” She added, “Shouldn’t the president prioritize the healthy growth of youth?”
• Related Link.

ICYMI.

Trump’s Hot Takes, for a Price.

• Trump’s Truth Social posts sometimes move markets. What if paying customers could see them first?
• Truth Social is considering selling early access to Trump’s posts.
• Trump has the most followers on Truth Social, with 12.9 million. According to the Wall Street Journal, he posts 400–600 times monthly.
• Richard Painter (former White House ethics lawyer) noted, “He has no right to trade on or pass along information for a fee.”
• Anna Kelly (White House spokesperson) stated, “The president’s investment accounts are managed by a third-party financial institution,” adding, “There is no conflict of interest.”
• Related Link.

AlphaGo’s Successor Defeated.

• Shin Jin-seo (baduk player) defeated Katago with a 2-stone handicap. He reportedly focused on studying the 3-3 joseki in AI baduk.
• 1 win, 1 loss. The third match will be held on the 21st.

U.S. Student Visa Caps at Four Years.

• The U.S. government will limit the stay of F-visa international students and J-visa exchange visitors to a maximum of four years. After four years, they must obtain a separate extension approved by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
• This could force students in six-year Ph.D. programs to abandon their studies midway.
• Koreans include 11,861 F-1 students, 1,347 dependents (F-2), 7,985 J-1 exchange visitors, 3,180 dependents (J-2), and 349 I-visa journalists. Nationwide, student visas total 1.8 million, and visitor visas around 500,000.

Worth Reading.

Decentralization Is the Answer.

• “It’s just a sophistic argument that a blind gatekeeper guards the door better.”
• Kim Kyu-hyun (Attorney) emphasized, “The target needing reform is not supplementary investigative authority but prosecution power.”
• “If we only separate powers, the police monopolize investigations and the prosecution monopolizes indictments. Monopolies inevitably rot. The answer is ‘decentralization’: the police investigate, but the prosecution checks them with limited supplementary authority; the prosecution indicts, but this is checked by strengthened prosecution review requests, the Corruption Investigation Office, and a Korean-style grand jury. This multi-layered structure—‘decentralization’ beyond mere ‘separation’—is the framework for prosecutorial reform in the AI era.”
• Related Link.

A World Where Money Begets Money.

• From January next year, a 22% capital gains tax on virtual assets will take effect.
• Earning 100 million won from coin investments means paying 22 million won in taxes, but earning the same from stocks requires only 200,000 won—0.2% including transaction and agricultural special taxes.
• What about real estate? It’s discounted by 69% for “official price realization rate” and 60% for “fair market value ratio.” The tax was already low, but excessive deductions have turned it into a patchwork mess.
• Lim Ji-sun (Kyunghyang Shinmun Business Editor) emphasized, “The government’s role is to consistently apply the principle that ‘where there is income, there is tax,’ whether it’s real estate, stocks, or virtual assets.”
• Related Link.