Cheong Wa Dae has lodged a formal protest with Bloomberg News over its report that framed a “citizen dividend” proposal by Kim Yong-beom, presidential chief of staff for policy, as a plan to redistribute “excess profits” from artificial intelligence-related companies, government officials said Friday.
In a letter sent Thursday, the presidential office expressed “serious concern” over the way the US news outlet reported Kim’s personal Facebook post.
Cheong Wa Dae said Bloomberg’s framing was inaccurate and had caused real confusion in the market, weighing on investor sentiment. It urged Bloomberg to acknowledge the error and apologize for what it described as the report’s adverse impact on the market.
The dispute centers on whether Kim’s remarks referred to the use of additional tax revenue or the redistribution of corporate profits.
Cheong Wa Dae said Kim’s proposal concerned how the government could use possible “excess tax revenue,” including corporate tax revenue, not sharing profits earned by private companies.
Portraying the idea as a plan to distribute “excess profits” from AI-related companies amounted to a serious misreading, the office said.
It also asked Bloomberg to correct the impression, reflected in its reports and editorials, that Kim had first floated the idea of sharing corporate profits before later walking it back. Cheong Wa Dae said the account was untrue.
Cheong Wa Dae also stressed that Kim had not called for redistributing corporate profits, imposing a windfall tax on companies or transferring private-sector earnings directly to the public.
The office said Bloomberg’s interpretation helped spread a misleading narrative that hurt market stability and Korea’s credibility. It also said accurately conveying the context of an official’s remarks is a basic responsibility of the press.
Bloomberg has yet to respond to the letter, officials said.
Kim wrote on Facebook on Monday that the benefits of the AI infrastructure era were “not the result of efforts made by certain companies alone.” He referenced a potential “citizen dividend” as a way to return such gains to the public.
Cheong Wa Dae said the post was meant to raise the question of how additional tax revenue should be used if generated, not to suggest taking profits from private firms.
Bloomberg carried the remarks under the headline “South Korea Floats ‘Citizen Dividend’ Using AI Profits,” and linked them to declines in shares of Samsung Electronics and SK hynix, two of Korea’s major chipmakers seen as key beneficiaries of the AI boom.
yeeun@heraldcorp.com
