“People call him the Chairman of Bithumb,” Park Min-young is secretly dating a suspicious wealthy man
Park Min-young is in love. Her boyfriend is Kang Jong-hyun, a newly-arise rich man, who is (totally) covered behind a veil.
On December 29th, 2021, Park Min-young declared the end of her four-year contract with Namu Actors. The very next day, she announced her new agency. On December 30, 2021, she signed an exclusive contract with Hook Entertainment, which is a subsidiary of Chorok Baem Media led by corporate hunter Won Young-sik. Hook is also a place that has a close relationship with Park Min-young’s lover, Kang Jong-hyun.
Park Min-young is in love. Her boyfriend is Kang Jong-hyun, a newly-arise rich man, who is (totally) covered behind a veil. Dispatch has captured the secret dating between Park Min-young and Kang Jong-hyun, as well as tracking Kang Jong-hyun’s secret identity for two months.
The story from now on is the true nature of Kang Jong-hyun, triggered by his dating relationship with Park Min-young.
<Note: The article is quite long. In addition, there are many contents related to the economy, such as circular investment, non-capital M&A, CB, call options, and fraudulent transactions, which can be hard to comprehend. So let’s start with a brief summary.>
1. Park Min-young’s boyfriend is Kang Jong-hyun (1982), a mysterious wealthy man.
2. Kang Jong-hyun’s business card includes the chairman of Bident, Inbiogen, Bucket Studio, and Bithumb Live. Bident and Bucket Studio are KOSDAQ-listed, and Inbiogen is KOSPI-listed.
3. Another title of Kang Jong-hyun is the chairman of Bithumb. In fact, the Bident that he actually owns is the single largest shareholder of Bithumb Holdings. Bithumb Holdings is the parent company of Bithumb Korea.
4. Kang Jong-hyun lives in a luxury villa in Hannam-dong. It’s where Park Min-young often stays at. Dispatch has witnessed Park Min-young walking out from this Hannam-dong villa, not from her Cheongdam-dong’s home, multiple times.
5. Kang Jong-hyun rides a Maybach SUV, Lamborghini, Bentley, and Rolls-Royce. He rides a sprinter van when he goes to top-notch golf courses such as Wellington. A ‘trick’ to use a private lane.
6. Park Min-young is riding a Lamborghini Urus and a Bentley. Among those, we received a tip that the yellow Urus is a gift from her boyfriend Kang Jong-hyun and is not owned by Park Min-young.
7. Dispatch has no choice but to raise suspicions of borrowed-name transactions (reasonably). There is no company, house, car, golf course, or anything registered under Kang Jong-hyun’s name. He is holding ‘full possession’ of nothing.
8. Why is Dispatch more interested in Kang Jong-hyun than Park Min-young? He’s a major (hidden) shareholder of Bithumb. Kang Ji-yeon, the single largest shareholder of Bithumb Holdings, is his sister. This is their economic community.
9. There is another economic community related to Kang Jong-hyun. It’s the “Cell Phone” and “Arena” lines. His close brothers who used to sell mobile phones together with him and the MDs who used to serve in the club appear as investment association heads on the CB list of listed companies.
10. The tens of millions of won in wine that Kang Jong-hyun drinks overnight is the blood of the Bitcoin antminers. The ‘Richard Mill’ on his wrist is the tears of the Bitcoin antminers. Suspicious transactions of ‘Bident’, ‘Inbiogen’ and ‘Bucket’ give such hints.
11. He also joined hands with Chairman Won Young-sik, who is called a corporate hunter. He mixed “Chorok Baem” with blood. This is why Park Min-young moved to Hook, a subsidiary of Chorok Baem, shortly after her FA declaration.
That’s all for the one-line brief summary. We’ll continue with Park Min-young’s love and Kang Jong-hyun’s real identity below.
◆ “Dior and Hermes”
August 3rd, 2022. Park Min-young received a break while filming the drama “Love In Contract”. Park Min-young is a “professional” with excellent self-management as she went to a ballet academy (on her day off) to take care of her body.
Park Min-young wore Dior from head to toe. Despite the hot weather, Park Min-young wore a Dior hooded top and a Dior bucket hat.
4:05 p.m. Park Min-young finished her ballet class. A Mercedes-Benz Sprinter was already waiting for her to take her to Wonju, where Kang Jong-hyun is living.
Park Min-young and Kang Jong-hyun got off at an apartment in Wonju. Kang Jong-hyun took the lead, and Park Min-young followed.
◆ “Today, we are going to our parents’ house”
It’s 8:25 p.m. They walked out of the apartment where Kang Jong-hyun’s mother was also seen seeing the couple off in person. Park Min-young and Kang’s mother seemed quite friendly.
Park Min-young and Kang Jong-hyun went back to the Sprinter van. Their next destination is Cheongdam-dong, Seoul where Park Min-young lives in a luxury villa with her parents.
This time, Park Min-young got off first to open the common front door and call the elevator while Kang Jong-hyun held a gift box for Park’s parents.
Park Min-young and Kang Jong-hyun traveled back and forth between Seoul and Wonju to visit both their parents’ houses. The two is already an official couple recognized by adults from both families.
◆ “Who is Kang Jong-hyun?”
At this point, everyone is bound to be curious about Kang Jong-hyun. What are his charms that captivated Park Min-young? Dispatch has analyzed him for two months.
Kang Jong-hyun is the chairman of “Bident,” “Inbiogen,” “Bucket Studio,” and “Bithumb Live.” Bident and Bucket Studio are KOSDAQ-listed, and Inbiogen is KOSPI-listed company.
Kang Jong-hyun is also called the hidden chairman of Bithumb. Bident is the largest single shareholder of Bithumb Holdings with a stake of more than 34%.
However, Kang Jong-hyun is a hidden wealthy man. The word “hidden” here means that he is hiding behind something. His name does not appear in any data related to the mentioned company.
As if Kang Jong-hyun moves under borrowed names, when Dispatch inquired Bident and Inbiogen about Kang, the company satff said, “Chairman Kang Jong-hyun? Who? There is only CEO Kang Ji-yeon.”
That’s right, the head of those three listed companies is his younger sister Kang Ji-yeon. Without revealing himself, Kang Jong-hyun lives in a villa in Hannam-dong, rides supercars, wears high-end watches, and drinks the world’s top five wines.
How did he accumulate such wealth?
◆ “Tracking down his past”
Kang Jong-hyun studied at a university in Gangwon then dropped out of school. In 2010, he established the mobile phone sales business DOlleh Communications with his father in Gwangju. Kang Jong-hyun operated a KT consignment agency and also supplied terminals to other agencies.
Kang Jong-hyun defrauded about 3.5 billion won from A Capital and was charged with fraud and forgery of private documents in 2013-2014.
He was sentenced to two years and 6 months in prison with a 3-year suspended sentence and ordered 80 hours of community service in 2016.
Around 2014-2015, he participated in the bypass loan of Financial Company A. In the process, he borrowed 3 billion won, 2 billion won and 4 billion won more by taking advantage of Company A’s weaknesses. His debt increased as even his younger sister Kang Ji-yeon got involved.
Private placement bonds issued against Financial Company A totaled 42.2 billion won and it is confirmed that the amount remaining as uncollected bonds at Financial Company A is more than 12 billion won.
◆ “Take the Money and Run”
What Kang Jong-hyun did in 2013, 2014 and 2015 can be outlined as follow.
Kang Jong-hyun made money through selling cellphones, borrowing, and defrauding money. He participated in the bypass loan of Financial Company A and swallowed more than 10 billion won.
Kang Jong-hyun was arrested for fraud in 2016 and sentenced to prison. Financial Company A urged him to pay debts but he didn’t seem to follow actively.
There is one reason why Dispatch tracked down Kang Jong-hyun. He suddenly reappeared in 2020 and owned 3 KOSDAQ-listed companies and Bithumb.
From this moment, a fairly complex story unfolds. So, how did Kang Jong-hyun raise 23 billion won? Acquisition funding is the answer to this question.
◆ “Appeared with 23 billion won”
In August 2020, “Initial” appeared in the M&A market. The owner of “Initial” is Kang Ji-yeon, Kang Jong-hyun’s younger sister.
With only 23 billion won (?), “Initial” swallowed the apex of “Vidente + Inbiogen + Bucket Studio“.
23 billion, is it Kang Ji-yeon’s money?
Kang Ji-yeon was born in 1984. Her work experience is all about the CEO of a corporation called “Aiti Mart” (2015). It is a company that supplied mobile phone accessories to coffee shops and agencies.
Aiti Mart had sales of 4.7 billion won in 2018. Net profit during the term was 70 million won. Such siblings made 23 billion won overnight.
To sum up, Kang Jong-hyun ran a mobile phone business. His younger sister Kang Ji-yeon sold accessories. Then, in 2020, they became the owners of three KOSDAQ-listed companies. How can we explain it?
We can’t help but wonder more about Kang Jong-hyun’s whereabouts in 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019.
◆ “Find Kang Jong-hyun’s 4 years”
First of all, Kang Jong-hyun was active as a VVVIP in a Gangnam club in 2018. He is the kind of man who pays 100 million won of champagne a night.
Dispatch found the name of Kang Jong-hyun (#jasper) on X and Y’s Instagram. In April 2018, he burst 100 million won in champagne at his birthday party.
What is noteworthy here is the fact that the relationship between Kang Jong-hyun and X, Y continues to this day. X and Y liquidated their club businesses and are currently working as managers at a restaurant in Cheongdam-dong run by Kang Ji-yeon.
X and Y’s names are even found in the CB investor lists of Inbiogen and Vidente. In particular, Y participated as a member of the “Initial No.1 Investment” in 2021 and invested more than 9 billion won.
◆ “4 years are still unsolved”
The last time Kang Jong-hyun’s whereabouts were confirmed was in 2016. He disappeared after defrauding more than 15 billion won from K Capital and A Financial Company. (Of course, he was active as Jasper in the Gangnam club.)
Dispatch met anonymous informants (C, D, E) and asked them about his mysterious 4 years.
C said, “It’s true that Kang Jong-hyun didn’t pay back the money to the financial sector. He hid behind his younger sister and put her in front instead.”
According to D, Kang Jong-hyun did something in Thailand. “He’s been in and out of Thailand often since 2016. He said he’s running a resort business, but nothing has been confirmed.”
E talked about Kang Jong-hyun’s gangster connections. “Kang Jong-hyun was close to gangsters in Seongnam. He did something in Pattaya.”
◆ “Things that Kang Jong-hyun should clarify”
First of all, “I made 23 billion won by selling cell phones” does not make sense. Most of the mobile phone-related corporations operated under the names of Kang Jong-hyun’s family members (younger sister and brother-in-law) at that time have been dissolved.
Next, “I bought it with the money I have to pay back to A Financial Company” is a legal problem. If he goes bankrupt intentionally without paying your debt, it is equivalent to fraud or evasion of compulsory execution.
What if he claims “I hit the jackpot in Thailand”? If so, he has to explain why he is hiding behind his younger sister.
◆ “Listed companies, CB printing factories”
Kang Ji-yeon, no, Kang Jong-hyun drew 6 steps for domination (?) of “Bithumb”. Initial -> Bucket Studio -> Inbiogen -> Vidente -> Bithumb Holdings -> Bithumb Korea.
What kind of companies are Bucket, Inbiogen and Vidente? NFT? Bio? Metaverse? They quickly absorbed the KOSDAQ theme. However, there is no clear model, structure or achievement.
In fact, Bucket’s sales in the previous year were 26.4 billion won. The operating loss was 2.1 billion won. Inbiogen’s sales were 10.5 billion won. The operating loss was 7.9 billion won. Vidente made an operating profit of 800 million won with sales of 17.7 billion won.
Nevertheless, the money is overflowing. Since Kang Ji-yeon became the CEO (August 2020), CB, BW, and convertible preferred shares, etc. mounted to 781.3 billion won.
And by the time the convertible bonds are released, there was a burst in the materials. On the day when it is possible to exercise the conversion right, you can see a number of cases in which stock prices rise sharply.
◆ “The burst in the materials”
According to an article on Bloomberg on July 23rd, FTX, a virtual asset exchange led by the American billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried, is seeking to acquire Bithumb in Korea.
Thanks to this news, Vidente hit the ceiling. On July 25th, it closed at 11,900 won (29.77% up). It was 12,800 won on the next day.
In July 2021, Vidente issued 100 billion won worth of CB and BW. The conversion value was 8,013 won. Participants were able to rob stocks at 12,800 won or more on July 27, 2022.
Is it a coincidence? Ordinary investors who did not know Kang Jong-hyun experienced hell due to the endless fall of Vidente. But investors who knew Kang Jong-hyun got more than 50%.
◆ “Their love is beautiful, but the rest is suspicious”
Park Min-young is in love with Kang Jong-hyun. He’s an emerging big hand in Gangnam who owns Vidente, INBIOGEN, Bucket Studio, and Bithumb Live.
Dispatch already confirmed the fraud he committed in 2014, 2015 and 2016. His process of accumulating money in 2017 and 2018 and 2019 is still being investigated.
Why did Kang Jong-hyun put his younger sister Kang Ji-yeon at the front? It is necessary to carefully examine the illegal profits obtained from borrowed-name transactions and further tax evasion.
Finally, we need to look at CB’s suspicious flow of funds.
His romance with Park Min-young is beautiful. But what is happening in the stock and coin markets doesn’t look so pretty. This is why Dispatch revealed their romantic relationship and raised suspicions at the same time.
Dispatch asked Kang Jong-hyun 6-7 questions but his answer was contrary to much of what the magazine covered. For example, he argued, “People around me just call me chairman, but I have nothing to do with it.” Fact check about Kang Jong-hyun’s explanation will be revealed in the next article by Dispatch.
Source: dispatch
