자산담보부기업어음(ABCP)에 관한 법제도적 문제

This research paper examines the evolution of ABCP issuance in Korea, the role of market participants, and the legal status of ABCP under the Bills Act and Capital market and Financial Investment Service Act. ABCP could be said that it is short-term liability issued by a ABCP vehicle. Types of ABCP conduits include multi-seller conduit, single seller conduit, and securities arbitrage conduit. A bank or other financial institution will always be involved in the process of creating ABCP. In particular, many ABCP vehicles had recourse to sponsor banks that set up these vehicles as off-balance sheet structures but provided them with liquidity and credit enhancements. The outstanding of ABCP as a cash money market instrument, started in Korea in the late 1970 s and now its market developed. As The Capital market and Financial Investment Provider Act has enacted, the regulation on the operation of ABCP program is mostly abolished. Therefore, it is expected that ABCP program will be more popular and the industry could make diverse products based on portfolios backed by enormously complex financial derivatives. It will be creating what is a far riskier product that it had not been previously. Now, many ordinary retail investors could get ABCP. Retail ABCP holders seemed to be conservative investors seeking safe vehicles for their money. ABCP notes, while highly rated by credit rating companies, do not guarantee that the principal could be returned. Their interest payments and return of principal depend on the performance of a portfolio of assets underlying the notes. For ABCP whose assets are more complex financial derivatives, it is apparently seemed to be safer, however it is not in reality. There are a form of guarantee of banks who are under contract to buy the paper from investors if nobody else would, but when the market freeze. However, most of the backing banks apt to use loophole in the contracts to avoid paying. Financial regulation makes rating decisions important in establishing what assets can be held by certain types of financial intermediaries. At the same time, rating agencies cannot be held legally accountable for their decisions because they claim that their ratings are only opinions and not accurate predictions of the risk of a given instrument. In selling the ABCP, brokers should do more to analyze and understand ABCP before recommending it to retail clients. However, the dealer views ABCP as cashable money market instrument that had obtained the highest possible credit rating. The regulator and investment dealers seem to have paid little or no attention to the underlying assets of the ABCP program. It is self-evident that if the investment dealers recommend unsuitable for financial consumers, it leads to liability on the part of investment dealers to any individual. Recognized these problems, this study makes several recommendations relating to increasing product transparency, resolving of conflicts of interest, and strenthening disclosure of credit ratings.