Chung Young-chae, CEO of NH Investment & Securities. (Photo: NHIS)

Chung Young-chae was reelected as CEO of NH Investment & Securities. NH Investment & Securities made the decision in a board meeting on March 5. Chung will head up the company for two more years, until March 2022.

Chung graduated from the Department of Business Administration at Seoul National University. After graduation, he served as head of funding, head of investment banking, head of planning, and managing director in charge of the IB business at Daewoo Securities.

In 2005, Chung joined Woori Investment & Securities, the predecessor of NH Investment & Securities, and was appointed president in 2018.

Many financial industry watchers predicted that Chung would be able to extend his term as CEO as he took the lead in NH Investment & Securities recording strong business performances.

NH Investment & Securities enjoyed its best business performances by posting 540.1 billion won in operating profit and 361.5 billion won in net income since its foundation in 2018, the first year of Chung’s presidency.

In 2019, the company’s operating profit jumped 6.5 percent on year to 575.4 billion won and net profit 31.8 percent to 476.4 billion won. Chung is building a stable profit structure based on his rich experience in the IB business.

NH Investment & Securities’ IB revenue in 2019 reached 326 billion won, up 21.3 percent from 268.7 billion won in 2018. The company served as a lead manager for 16 IPO deals for S&K, Hanwha Systems, and Zinus, and carried out activities for the acquisition of rights offerings for Doosan Heavy Industries, Doosan E&C, and Helix Smith.

In the debt capital market (DCM), NH Investment & Securities took charge of the acquisition of corporate bonds such as GS E&C, Hanon Systems, Kyobo Securities, Hanwha Life Insurance, Ssangyong Cement, and LG Chem.

In the real estate sector, the securities firm brokered domestic landmark deals such as Samsung SDS Tower, the Yeouido MBC Site Development Project and Seoul Square.

The company also bagged 92.3 billion won in commissions for debt guarantees by taking part in refinancing deals for Daesung Industrial Gas and Hanon Systems.

Chung also abolished the KPI Program in January 2019 and set up a long-term customer base by introducing a process valuation system.

Therefore, since then, salespeople have been evaluated using customer satisfaction indicators such as the number of communications with customers and customer satisfaction instead of performance-based indicators such as commission incomes.

Chung has placed a priority on what efforts salespeople made in attracting customers and reaching their business goals. His strong belief is that if a salesman builds a steady relationship with a customer, he will be able to turn his brokerage sales into more comprehensive asset management sales.

In the meantime, NH Investment & Securities was honored as the top ranked firm in the securities-financial product category in the 2019 National Customer Satisfaction Index (NCSI) survey conducted by the Korea Productivity Center in late 2019.

The NCSI was developed and has been measured by the Korea Productivity Center in collaboration with the University of Michigan since 1998.

It is an index that evaluates the satisfaction and loyalty of customers who used products and services.

In this survey, NH Investment & Securities claimed first place in the financial product category for two consecutive years.

The securities firm proclaimed the Financial Consumer Protection Charter in 2013 and since then, has actively practiced consumer centered management (CCM) with the goal of providing the highest value to customers.

For the first time in the Korean financial industry, the company introduced a long-term customer base by introducing a process valuation system.

The system zeroes in on customer satisfaction indicators such as the number of communications with customers and customer satisfaction.