It is not rare for Korean tycoons -- especially those from family-run chaebol –- to be punished for their wrongdoings, ranging widely from embezzlement, operation of slush funds and tax evasion to bribery, offering illegal political funds and insider trading.

Of these, the last one -- illegal stock trading utilizing insider information -- has come to the fore again recently in the wake of two prominent cases, which, once again, showed how greedy and shameless some of the wealthy in this country are.

The two cases -- involving Dongbu Group chairman Kim Jun-ki and former Hanjin Shipping CEO Cho Eun-yeong -- are strikingly similar: They allegedly sold stocks of their own companies shortly before they were put under the control of creditors or the court to avoid bankruptcy.

Financial authorities said that their analysis of relevant data showed that Kim sold 620,000 shares -- worth 700 million won ($588,000) -- of Dongbu Corp., the group’s construction unit, in October 2014, two months before it applied for court receivership.

One can easily guess that Kim, founder of the group and owner of all of its affiliates, had access to information about the plan. The Financial Supervisory Service did the right thing by asking the prosecution to investigate the case.

This came close on the heels of another case involving Choi, who is expected to be summoned by prosecutors this week on a similar charge. Choi had already been questioned by financial authorities for suspicion that she and her two daughters dumped stocks of Hanjin, the crisis-hit flag carrier of containers, to avoid losses.

Financial officials said the Chois sold 669,248 shares worth about 3 billion won between April 6-20. The last round of the transactions took place only two days before the company sought a debt-rescheduling plan led by its creditor.

In short, the two superrich persons, acting on insider information, unloaded stocks to avoid personal losses at a time when their firms were struggling with a financial crisis that could cause immense losses to other shareholders and creditors and threaten the livelihoods of employees. 

Are they any different from the captain of the Sewol ferry who was one of the first to jump on a maritime police rescue boat, leaving behind more than 400 passengers in his sinking ship? It is indeed sickening that the respective amounts of money Kim and Choi saved --300 million won and 1 billion won -- were “peanuts” compared with their huge assets.

Insider trading is not the only problem with the two families. Data showed that Kim and his family members received dividends worth more than 110 billion won from Dongbu affiliates from 2011 to 2015. In the latter part of the period, the group was fast drifting into a financial crisis, which eventually placed key affiliates like Dongbu Corp. and Dongbu Steel under court receivership. Kim is also suspected of having held tens of billions of won worth of shares in Dongbu affiliates under borrowed names for more than two decades.

Choi could not be unmatched. The daughter-in-law of the late Hanjin Group founder Cho Choong-hoon handed over the debt-ridden Hanjin Shipping to the current chairman Cho Yang-ho in 2014, but pocketed 9.7 billion won in salary for the last two years apart and severance pay. It was also found that she opened a paper company in Virgin Islands in 2008.

These cases show that some of crooked tycoons in this country do not have any qualms about violating the law in pursuing their insatiable greed. The prosecution should bring both Kim and Choi to justice.