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SK Global lenders push for support
SEOUL, South Korea (Reuters) -- Creditors of South Korea's SK Global Co are pressing other units of the SK Group to extend more support to the troubled sister firm, a spokesman for the SK Group has said. The trading arm of the country's fourth-biggest conglomerate is expected to draw up a new round of self-rescue measures by Tuesday, after the unearthing of its $1.2 billion accounting fraud in March mauled financial markets for weeks. In the wake of the accounting scandal, SK Global unveiled a plan to raise a total of 4.2 trillion won ($3.42 billion) over the next five years. But creditors, led by the company's biggest local lender, Hana Bank, urged SK Global to do more. "Some creditors asked such a demand (of other units of the group granting more support to SK Global), albeit not officially," said the SK Group's spokesman who declined to be named. "But it looks like a means to press SK Global to come up with more drastic (restructuring) steps," he added. Creditor banks of SK Global could not be reached for comment. The Dong-a Ilbo newspaper said on Saturday the lenders of SK Global wanted two core units of the SK Group -- SK Corp and SK Telecom Co -- to provide more bailout to the debt-laden trading arm. Otherwise, the lenders will move to put SK Global into court receivership or seek its liquidation, the paper said. Payments frozenLast month, local creditors agreed to freeze payments on 6.7 trillion won of SK Global's debt until June 18 to prevent the firm from defaulting, and are now seeking a similar move by overseas lenders. Fears of any fallout of SK Global have pummeled shares of SK Corp and SK Telecom, leaving them vulnerable to a hostile takeover. Monaco-based Sovereign Asset Management rapidly became the main shareholder of the country's top oil refiner, SK Corp, after doing a bottom-fishing of the stock. But the oil refiner and mobile carrier SK Telecom dismissed those concerns last month, telling the Korea Stock Exchange in a public notice that they had no plan to join in bailing out the ailing trading affiliate. A spokesman for SK Telecom, Park Ji-hoon, told Reuters nothing had been changed in its stance on the beleaguered sister company since then, while SK Corp was not available for comment. Trading in shares of SK Global will be suspended on Monday after it failed to disclose its recent asset sale, according to the Korea Stock Exchange. Copyright 2003 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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