“Reporter Song Dong-seop of Daily Union (SNSJTV)” | TYM (KOSPI, 002900), a leading South Korean agricultural machinery company and a traditional powerhouse in tractors and rice transplanters under Chairman Kim Hee-yong, has been thrust onto the most grueling testing ground in its 75-year history.
Founded in 1951 and led by Chairman Kim Hee-yong for 39 years, this distinguished agricultural machinery house posted record-breaking results in 2025 with consolidated revenue of 929.3 billion won and operating profit of 64 billion won. At the same time, however, it faces an unprecedented governance crisis in which all three of the founder's third-generation grandchildren have become entangled in legal risks.
Behind the dazzling financial performance, market concerns are deepening because the non-financial value—specifically the "G" (Governance) axis of ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance)—is being shaken to its core.
A Succession Plan Already Cracking
Cracks in the succession structure were foreshadowed immediately after January 2024, when Chairman Kim Hee-yong officially designated his second son, Vice President Kim Sik (47), as his successor by gifting him his entire 9.62% stake (valued at 25.7 billion won at the time). Vice President Kim, holding a 22.09% stake (later reduced to 21.99%, and then to 20.06% after selling 800,000 shares through after-hours trading in February 2026) as the largest shareholder and Chief Operating Officer (COO), had effectively secured his position as the next-generation head of the group.
However, the second son—seemingly cruising along the succession path—was indicted and detained from May 2022 to February 2023 for violating the Act on the Control of Narcotics, receiving a sentence of one year in prison suspended for two years. While still on probation, in July 2024, he caused two traffic accidents in the Gangnam district of Seoul while under the influence of psychotropic drugs including methylphenidate, and was indicted without detention for violating the Road Traffic Act.
While he was found not guilty in the first trial, prosecutors appealed, and the second trial is currently underway, leaving moral risks and legal uncertainties ongoing. The eldest son, former Vice President Kim Tae-sik (53), was also summarily indicted four times between 2020 and 2022 for sexual misconduct-related charges—including posting obscene messages targeting a specific woman in group messenger chats, distributing pornographic content on Facebook, defamation, and insult. He was twice convicted and fined 2 million won, and in a civil case, was ordered to pay 3 million won in damages to the female victim, effectively forcing him out of management.
On top of this, Kim Do-hoon, the former co-CEO who had served as a professional manager for five years, came under prosecutorial investigation on charges of self-dealing, stock price manipulation, and embezzlement, leaving TYM in a state of "leadership vacuum" with both the owner family and professional management collapsing simultaneously.
The "Last Card", The Eldest Daughter
Ultimately, the "last card" Chairman Kim Hee-yong played was newly appointed CEO Kim So-won (48), the eldest daughter. CEO Kim was appointed as the new CEO of the parent company effective April 1, 2026, after serving as Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) and CEO of subsidiary TYMICT. Since joining the company in 2005, she has held various positions over 21 years, including PR executive and head of the Management Support Division. She is credited with leading the establishment of TYMICT in 2020—a subsidiary dedicated to developing autonomous agricultural machinery and smart farm technology—thereby laying the foundation for the group's digital transformation (DX).
The company stated, "She is the right person who has produced results in the smartification of agricultural machinery, including AI and autonomous driving," adding, "Vice President Kim Sik will fulfill his duties in the marketing and sales fields."
However, CEO Kim herself is not free from legal risks. Financial authorities determined that in 2022, TYM had inflated sales by "push-out" dumping 64 billion won worth of shipment-prohibited agricultural machinery onto dealerships. They imposed a fine of 1.1 billion won and issued a recommendation for the dismissal of CEO Kim, who was the executive in charge at the time.
The company filed an administrative lawsuit against the Securities and Futures Commission and obtained a court-granted stay of execution, then proceeded to appoint Kim as CEO. As a result, a contradictory situation has unfolded: "a person who received a dismissal recommendation for accounting fraud is simultaneously serving as CEO of a listed company while contesting that disposition through an administrative lawsuit."
In the market, there is even an assessment of "term-limited management rights," given that her position could be shaken depending on the final ruling.
A Paradigm Shift in Global Capital Markets
What deserves attention here is the paradigm shift in the criteria by which global capital markets evaluate companies. While in the past, quantitative indicators based on accounting and finance were the entirety of corporate value measurement, today the core agenda of capital markets is "important non-financial factors that affect investment decisions and long-term financial value"—namely, ESG.
Since 2020, when Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock—the world's largest asset manager—declared, "We will make corporate sustainability a criterion for investment decisions," the world's three major pension funds, including Norway's sovereign wealth fund, have been actively pursuing negative screening, excluding from investment companies that are corrupt, violate human rights, or have opaque governance structures.
The Korea Exchange's ESG portal also explicitly states, "Investors and consumers are placing greater emphasis on non-financial values rather than financial values when evaluating companies." It is already an established view that one of the core causes of the so-called "Korea Discount" is opaque and unfair owner-centric governance, and that the weakest point of Korean companies from an ESG perspective is "G (Governance)."
While Environmental (E) and Social (S) categories can be managed to some extent through quantitative disclosures and certifications, governance is directly tied to the "human realm" of the owner family's morality, compliance, and checks-and-balances mechanisms—making it the area most difficult to recover once it collapses.
Applying This Yardstick to TYM Yields Devastating Results
First, in terms of "transparency," TYM received fines from financial authorities and dismissal recommendations for executives due to accounting inflation through push-out sales, and its professional manager is being investigated on charges of self-dealing, stock manipulation, and embezzlement.
Second, in terms of "fairness," crimes and misconduct that are difficult to accept by social norms—drugs, drug-impaired driving, habitual sexual harassment, and distribution of obscene materials—have been repeatedly revealed across both third-generation owner brothers. Yet it has been repeatedly pointed out that no official, sincere apology or ethical management reform measures have ever been properly announced at the corporate level.
There has been no statement from the company regarding the female victim, and the company has consistently maintained a defensive stance of "the matter is under trial" regarding the drug and drug-impaired driving cases.
Third, even the stability of the owner family's stake—the core of governance—has been undermined.
As of the April 2026 disclosure, 7,988,748 shares (19.31% of issued shares) held by the owner family have been deposited with the Seoul Western District Court as tax payment collateral for the deferred payment of gift taxes. Looking at Vice President Kim Sik alone, approximately 5.7 million shares—about 68% of his 8.3 million shares—are double-pledged as both court deposits and financial collateral.
Vice President Kim also disposed of hundreds of thousands of shares through after-hours trading and block deals between January and February 2026, and pre-disclosed plans to sell an additional 828,000 shares (worth approximately 5.4 billion won) between February and March for the purpose of "securing funds to pay deferred gift taxes." A gift tax burden reaching 20 billion won is ultimately creating a vicious cycle of share sales, collateralization, and high dividends.
In fact, the year-end dividend for fiscal year 2025 surged 148.6% from 4.65 billion won the previous year to 11.559 billion won. The market has raised suspicions that "this is high-dividend payout to fund the owner family's gift taxes, separate from earnings improvement." It is a structure where the interests of minority shareholders and the private financial needs of the owner family could collide head-on.
The Absence of Checks and Balances
From an ethical management perspective, the cause of TYM's distancing from ethics ultimately lies in the absence of checks and balances. Owner family members occupy an absolute proportion and influence among registered executives, and there are no traces confirming that the substantive checking functions of outside directors and the audit committee have functioned.
While the eldest son's sexual misconduct led to four summary indictments, and while the second son's drug case was followed by drug-impaired driving during his suspended sentence period, no autonomous corporate-level disciplinary measures or actions by an ethics committee have been externally revealed. Companies that meet global ESG standards typically activate a five-step standard response manual when owner family executives become involved in serious misconduct: immediate suspension from position, fact-finding investigation through an external committee, victim relief, announcement of recurrence prevention measures, and an official apology from the CEO.
In TYM's case, throughout the series of events—the eldest son quietly stepping back from management, the second son weathering one crisis with a not-guilty verdict, and the eldest daughter being summoned as a "relief pitcher"—not a single step of this manual has officially or systematically operated, which is pointed out as the biggest problem. As a result, legal punishment has been reduced to individual judicial proceedings, while corporate-level ethical responsibility has been left in a vacuum.
Conflict Between Financial and Non-Financial Value
The conflict between financial and non-financial value from an investor's perspective is also stark. Financially, the company received an excellent report card with 2025 revenue of 929.4 billion won (up 17.8% year-on-year) and operating profit of 64.1 billion won (a roughly 300% surge), and has secured future growth narratives through autonomous and AI agricultural machinery and the SDV (Software-Defined Vehicle) transition.
Non-financially, however, negative signals are operating simultaneously: "all three third-generation owners entangled in legal risks," "a CEO who received a dismissal recommendation for accounting fraud," "personnel decisions pushed through via stay of execution," and "high dividends and share sales suspected of funding gift taxes."
From the perspective of global ESG institutional investors and Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) funds, TYM is already a stock whose investment eligibility is being questioned. Negative impacts are also unavoidable in the governance ratings of domestic ESG evaluation institutions such as the Korea ESG Research Institute and Sustinvest.
This is why concerns are being raised simultaneously that even with strong short-term performance, long-term capital procurement costs will rise, foreign investor share recovery will be slow, and the company could become a textbook example of the "Korea Discount."
Solutions Demanded by the Industry and Minority Shareholders
The solutions demanded by the industry and minority shareholders are clear:
First, an official corporate apology regarding the owner family's misconduct cases and a reorganization of the ethics charter.
Second, an expansion of the proportion of outside directors, the substantive empowerment of the audit committee, and the establishment of an independent ethics committee.
Third, the presentation of a rational rationale for the dividend policy so that the gift tax burden is not transferred to minority shareholders, and the strengthening of transparency in treasury share disposal.
Fourth, responsible follow-up measures based on the second-trial results of Vice President Kim Sik's drug-impaired driving case and the investigation results of former CEO Kim Do-hoon.
Fifth, clear disclosure and response plans regarding the administrative lawsuit results that can resolve the "term-limited management rights" controversy.
An industry insider commented, "The appointment of the eldest daughter would have been an unavoidable choice in this unprecedented situation where the largest shareholder is in court and the professional manager is under investigation," but added, "Given that all three siblings are entangled in legal risks, this personnel decision falls short of completely resolving the governance uncertainty that has spread in all directions."
Conclusion: Ethics Is Not a Cost, But Capital
Behind the dazzling number of 929.4 billion won in revenue, a larger shadow looms—the rapid depletion of the trust capital of a company that has supported Korean rural communities for 75 years with tractors and rice transplanters. In an era when global capital markets no longer judge companies by a single sheet of financial statements, "non-financial value" is "future financial value."
TYM's current situation, in that it compactly demonstrates the most precarious cross-section reached by the governance of mid-tier listed Korean companies, is the market's cold diagnosis: without the determination of the owner family and the company's self-purification efforts, even the future vision of "AI agricultural machinery" will be difficult to be fully evaluated by the market.
This publication has continuously requested rebuttal rights and interviews from TYM, but has not received any official response or position regarding the current controversies. We also inquired about the recent investigation pressure controversy that emerged due to attempted murder allegations during the suspended sentence period, as well as content that was deleted after media articles were published, but received no answers.
The proxy agent ended the matter by saying they could not respond because there was no answer from TYM headquarters, and confirmation contact regarding rebuttal rights via call or text was not made. Interview requests to headquarters also went unanswered.
This publication will reflect TYM's official position on rebuttal rights in future coverage, should it be revealed.
In the face of the proposition that ethics is not a cost but capital, the capital market and agricultural industry are watching together to see what answer TYM will provide.
Follow-up coverage, Following the recent TYM-related coverage, controversy and ripples are growing as articles by STV media outlets have been deleted.
Coverage related to the deletion of the S*TV report titled "'Eldest Son's Pornography Distribution, Second Son's Drug Charges'... Is TYM's Future the Eldest Daughter?", as well as coverage related to "Investigation Pressure Controversy Surrounding TYM Third Generation's Attempted Murder Allegations During Suspended Sentence Period" concerning the third generation of TYM—a Korean rural brand tractor and rice transplanter company—will be followed by additional video news and news reports.
