Israel Matzav

Fight over control of Samsung turns anti-Semitic

One South Korean news site, Mediapen.com, has been outspoken on the C&T-Cheil merger. At the time of writing, Wednesday evening, the site had no fewer than five articles about Samsung on its homepage, one a glowing profile of Samsung’s corporate leadership and the other four expressing support for the merger.

Among these was a Sunday column by journalist Kim Ji-ho (Korean-language link), who framed the Elliott-Samsung feud in stark terms.

“Jews are known to wield enormous power on Wall Street and in global financial circles,” Kim began. “It is a well-known fact that the US government is swayed by Jewish capital.”

Railing against Institutional Shareholder Services, or ISS, a proxy advisory firm that published an analysis of the merger that agreed with Elliott’s claims of C&T’s undervaluation, Kim explained to Mediapen’s readers that ISS was moved to side with Elliott because both represented “Jewish money.”

“The rationale for the assumption that ISS will be supportive of Elliott’s claims is that ISS, like Elliott, is founded upon Jewish money. Elliott’s CEO is Paul Singer, a Jew. ISS is an affiliate of MSCI, which is owned by Jewish major shareholders,” he wrote. And he added: “ISS’s opposition to the merger can be interpreted along the lines of Jewish alliance. Jewish money has long been known to be ruthless and merciless.”

The Times of Israel has not investigated whether MSCI, formerly Morgan Stanley Capital International but no longer affiliated with Morgan Stanley, is Jewish-owned, but it can confirm that it does not own ISS, which it sold in April 2014.

The vitriol in Kim’s column is pervasive. In a caption under Singer’s picture, the Jewish investor is described as a “greedy, ruthless head of a notorious hedge fund.”

Samsung itself advertises on Mediapen, offers interviews and media access, and receives almost total support from the site’s reporters and columnists. But Mediapen is nevertheless not one of South Korea’s major media outlets.

Seoul-based MoneyToday is.

In a June 22 report (Korean-language link) about Samsung’s response to the ISS report, the site explained why ISS might not be an objective party in the merger dispute.

“According to the finance industry, the fact that Elliott and ISS are both Jewish institutions cannot be ignored,” it reported. “Elliott is led by a Jew, Paul E. Singer, and ISS is an affiliate of Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI), whose key shareholders are Jewish. According to a source in the finance industry, Jews have a robust network demonstrating influence in a number of domains.”

The report on the mainstream MoneyToday was published almost two weeks before the appearance of the Mediapen report.

And there is no sign that the narrative of Samsung being victimized by a global cabal of Jewish financiers is dying down. The South Korean daily Munwha Ilbo followed up on Tuesday with a report headlined: “‘Jewish ISS’ blatantly supported ‘Jewish Elliott.’”

“Doubts are being raised about a possible ‘Jewish alliance’ as ISS issued a report which ignored the domestic judicial system and simply relayed Elliott’s claims,” the tabloid reported. “Elliott is led by Paul Singer, who is Jewish. ISS is an affiliate of MSCI, owned by Jewish major shareholders.”

Labels: anti-Semitism, South Korea

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 4:54 PM