The gloomy stock market has begun to claim victims with investors committing suicide after losing money in the recent series of crashes.
According to police reports, a 47-year-old man from Gwangju who suffered serious depression after huge losses on the stock market, committed suicide last Saturday,.
He invested 370 million won after taking out a mortgage on his house and using his life insurance as security for the loan two years ago, but the recent financial recession resulted in him losing about 60 percent of his total investment.
“When the nation’s stock market index fell below 1,000 last Friday, he stopped eating and went on a drinking binge for days and finally decided to kill himself,” his wife was quoted as saying to police.
On the same day, a couple in their 60s from Busan were saved by police during their suicide attempt.
They borrowed 100 million won from a security company last year and invested 130 million won on the stock market. But they lost most of the money in the recent crashes.
On Oct. 22, a 42-year-old branch manager of an insurance company was found dead in an apparent suicide on a mountain in Gongju, South Chungcheong Province. Police believe that he killed himself due to concerns over losses his firm recorded with various insurance products.
On Oct. 9, a 32-year-old employee from a security firm was found hanging at an inn in Seoul, which police claimed was also related to the stock market crash.
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