April 20, 2024

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[THE INVESTOR] Former MP Group Chairman Jung Woo-hyun officially conveyed to the Korea Exchange on Dec. 11 that he will no longer be involved in its management.

His submission to the bourse operator also noted that the biggest shareholders and two owner family members will take their hands off the group’s management. 

Former chairman Chung Woo-hyun

The decision came after a KRX committee decided to give the firm, which operates home-grown pizza chain Mr. Pizza, four months to improve its business before deciding to delist it from the secondary bourse KOSDAQ.

MP Group was put review for delisting in June as Jung was aused of embezzlement and breach of trust worth 15 billion won (US$13.45 million). In addition, the group recently forced all involved employees to resign.

“We took these measures to increase transparency. We will work hard to raise our shareholder’s value,” an MP Group official said in a statement.

This is not the first time that the company has been given a chance to normalize its business. To show its efforts to improve performance, it paid back around 50 billion won debt by selling part of its assets -- including a 35 percent stake in its subsidiary MP Han Kang in October.

However, the company has been losing money for the last three years. Its operating loss increased from 7.3 billion won to 11 billion won last year and KRX had preliminarily decided to delist it last week.

By Song Seung-hyun (ssh@heraldcorp.com)