US-based investor Fidelity Management & Research has offloaded common shares of Hyundai Marine & Fire Insurance worth 111.6 billion won ($102.2 million) on the local stock exchange since October, filings showed Friday.

Before the transactions, Fidelity was the third-largest shareholder of Hyundai Marine & Fire, listed on South Korea‘s main stock bourse Kospi, holding 11 percent of its voting rights. That followed Chairman Chung Mong-yoon’s 24.65 percent and the National Pension Service‘s 11.25 percent.

Selling 4.88 million common shares of Hyundai Marine & Fire, or 6.1 percent of the outstanding shares, Fidelity’s ownership in the Seoul-based insurer reduced to less than 5 percent, removing its obligation to disclose its stock ownership in the company on a regular basis.

The sales price ranged from 22,000 won to 25,000 won per share, disclosures showed.

Fidelity said in a filing that it had to sell off the stock holdings because some of its funds under its umbrella were liquidated.

The news comes nearly four years after Fidelity first emerged as a shareholder with a disclosure obligation in March 2017, buying the Hyundai Marine & Fire shares at between 30,000 won and 33,000 won. Fidelity has since been one of the notable foreign shareholders of Hyundai Marine & Fire, along with BlackRock Fund Advisors.

Since March 2017, Hyundai Marine & Fire‘s share price has fallen some 30 percent.

Hyundai Marine & Fire‘s net profit from January to September came to 339.8 billion won, up nearly 40 percent on-year.

By Son Ji-hyoung (consnow@heraldcorp.com)