![“I feel like I’ve been robbed for 30 years”… Returning John Lee Dreams of Act 2 of Life [인터뷰]](https://i0.wp.com/img.hankyung.com/photo/202302/01.32650018.1-1200x.jpg?fit=%2C&ssl=1 "“I feel like I’ve been robbed for 30 years”… Returning John Lee Dreams of Act 2 of Life [인터뷰]")
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Interview with John Lee, former CEO of Meritz Management
return to new book
“I’ve dedicated it for 9 years, but I’ve become shameless in a day”
Family camp starts in Paju… Goal of Resolving Financial Illiteracy
“Last June, when Internet articles were all over the place with my name, was a terrible nightmare. Every day, I must have felt like the plane I was riding on crashed. I’ve dedicated 9 years to promoting the company, and I’ve ruined the brand overnight. He turned into a human being. He said he used his wife’s account to make illegal investments. Eventually, I felt like I had been robbed of the 30 years I had been in the financial industry.”
John Lee, former CEO of Meritz Asset Management, stepped down last year after suspicions of borrowed-name investment arose. Although the era of the first generation of value investors was coming to an end with the birth of successors, no one expected such an early exit.
Former CEO John Lee, who was active as a star manager on Wall Street, joined as the new head of Meritz Investment Management at the end of 2013 and increased the scale of management centered on ‘Meritz Korea Fund’. He was the one who enjoyed celebrity-level popularity by pouring out numerous stock investment quotes in the media. But now, after about 10 years in office, he’s an independent and the company has been sold to a local activist private equity fund.
recently published book <존 리, 새로운 10년의 시작>In , former CEO John Lee summarized his experiences at Meritz Asset Management and included plans for the next 10 years. Around the time of his resignation, he also answered the questions he had been following, such as ‘How do you feel about the suspicion of borrowed-name investment’ and ‘Why did you leave the company?’. <한경닷컴>met former CEO John Lee at the Korea International Finance Institute in Namsan-dong, Seoul on the 15th. It has been eight months since the controversy that he revealed his face to the media.
“In an instant, 30 years of reputation collapse… Borrowed name investment is not true”
One of the big changes in the meantime is that the public’s modifier has changed. Keywords such as ‘John Bong-jun’ (Jeon Bong-jun + John Lee) and ‘Donghak ant movement vanguard’, which used to modify former CEO John Lee, were replaced by ‘suspicion of borrowed-name investment’ and ‘disgraceful resignation’. This is the reason why some point out that ‘it is too early to start’ as the financial authorities have not yet issued a disposition on the alleged borrowed-name investment. To a reporter asking for his position, former CEO John Lee emphasized, “There is no such thing as a borrowed-name account, and I have never made any illegal investments.”
“Since the first report came out, articles that did not go through identity verification have been pouring in. Even if I explained the unfair position, nothing changed, and the people around me dissuaded me by saying, ‘Don’t create more controversy for nothing, just stay still'” and admitted that he did not voluntarily resign. explained
What will former CEO John Lee do now? Rumors abounded that he might be moving back to the US, but in the end he decided to settle down in Korea. For now, he said, he has no intention of running an asset management company again or getting a job in the financial sector. Instead, he said that he had a strong desire to develop the version of ‘Visiting Lecture’, which he had practiced since his days as CEO of Meritz Asset Management. The ultimate goal is to free the entire people from the state of ‘financial illiteracy’.
The main theme of the second act of life is to solve financial illiteracy… “I’m already overwhelmed”
As the first project for this, he recently started a financial education program, ‘John Lee’s School for the Rich’. The ‘English Village’ in Paju, Gyeonggi Province is rented out and a two-day, one-night camp is being held on a weekly basis. The unique point is that it is a ‘family camp’ in which families participate. “It’s because it’s much more effective for the whole family to try to become rich than individual people trying to become rich,” former CEO John Lee explained. Because of this purpose, the daughter-in-law, father-in-law, newlyweds, father and son in elementary school visited together and received financial education.
Former CEO John Lee also began running programs targeting non-metropolitan residents and financially underprivileged people. He gives regular offline lectures such as ‘Korea Future Billie Near Club’ for children, ‘Investment Class for Office Workers’ and ‘Investment Class for Housewives’.
Former CEO John Lee announced that he would focus on ‘financial education for the next generation’ for the next 10 years. There are still many difficulties in the Korean financial market. He cited three absences: ‘financial education’, ‘entrepreneurial spirit’, and ‘utilization of female human resources’ as factors impeding the development of Korea’s economic powerhouse. He explained, “Early financial education has become far off due to the low level of understanding of finance by most of the people, and the entrepreneurial spirit of young people has disappeared as opportunities for creative thinking are reduced in a society where only the so-called ‘Kook Young-soo’ is emphasized.”
Regarding the absence of female financiers, he said, “It is a big problem that a society where they are not properly treated or utilized is maintained.” There is. We have to change our stereotypes and consciousness about the role of women.”
It is a structural problem, but women also said that they should change their thinking. He said, “People often think that you have to compete with men and win to become an executive, but why don’t you think of starting a financial company yourself?”
He also gave advice on the stock market, which is showing a rebound this year. The theory of ‘saving coffee and stocks’ was still valid. He said, “Now that the KOSPI index is less than 2,500, there are still many coveted cheap stocks among Korean stocks. It’s good to use it,” he said. He added, “Recently, I am looking with interest in stocks that show signs of corporate governance improvement or mergers and acquisitions (M&A) by activist funds.”
Before ending the interview, former CEO John Lee left a message asking for it to be included in the article. “90% of Koreans do not enjoy financial benefits such as dividend income. It is my wish that every single citizen has more financial assets. For the next 10 years, many people will become economically independent and our country will become a financial powerhouse. My heart is already full of excitement when I think of what I will do for the future. Now, I want to be called a new modifier, ‘a pioneer in financial education in Korea’.”
Shin Min-kyung, Hankyung.com reporter radio@hankyung.com
