Rhyu Si-min: “Bought stocks for the first time, believing Lee’s ‘KOSPI 5,000’ pledge... Net worth? Not even half of 10 billion won”

[Financial News] Writer Rhyu Si-min said of his wealth, “It’s less than 10 billion won. It’s not even half that.”
On the 29th, Rhyu appeared on the YouTube channel Park Si-young TV and gave this answer when the host asked about the size of his assets.

“Until I retired from politics in 2013, I had never saved money,” he said. “I was just living that way, month after month and year after year, and then I thought I should prepare for retirement and pay for the children’s education, so I needed to earn some money and save. So from then on, I wrote one book every year.”
He added, “Those books sold reasonably well, so I paid my taxes and lived while saving diligently. I also bought a home, like ordinary people do.”
In response to the host’s remark that he would need to enter public office or become a presidential candidate for his exact net worth to be known, Rhyu said, “There’s no need to know that, and I’m not someone who has to disclose it, am I?”
Rhyu also spoke about his experience investing in stocks. “I had never owned stocks until the year before last,” he said. “I had just kept some money in deposits, then a change of government became certain and President Lee Jae Myung made his ‘stock index at 5,000’ pledge, didn’t he? I believed it and used my savings to buy stocks for the first time.”
When the host said, “You must have made a lot if you got in then,” Rhyu replied, “The amount I invested was small, so although the rate of return is high, the actual profit isn’t that much. It was when the KOSPI was still below 3,000.” He added, “I bought a little in exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and a few semiconductor stocks. I was trying it out bit by bit.”

Meanwhile, addressing internet users raising “allegations of involvement with SillaJen,” Rhyu said, “Those making that claim have to prove it. If someone claims there’s a bone china teapot orbiting Earth somewhere between Earth and the Moon, who has to prove it? The person making the claim has to prove it. How do you prove something that doesn’t exist?”
He continued, “All this talk about what a statement said or what something else said is just interpretation of things that happened in the past, so dissect it however you like. Those claiming something exists have to prove that it does. I can’t prove that something doesn’t exist, so I’m just leaving it at that.”
[email protected] Kim Su-yeon Reporter