Chey to Sell $700 Million in SK Stock Amid Divorce

Chey Tae-won, the billionaire behind memory chipmaker SK Hynix Inc., is selling 944 billion won ($700 million) worth of shares in the conglomerate SK Inc., amid what is set to be among South Korea’s most expensive divorces.

The sale will amount to a 2.26% stake in SK Inc., the company said in a regulatory filing Friday. Chey currently has a 17.76% stake in SK Inc., it said.

Chey is selling the shares for personal purposes related to a property-division lawsuit, SK said in a separate statement, without specifying whether the proceeds would go toward the divorce case.

The sale places a spotlight on the magnitude of the divorce and Chey’s wealth, which has soared on the back of the artificial-intelligence boom that is fueling demand for SK Hynix’s advanced memory chips. SK Hynix’s shares have risen more than 182% this year in Korea. The company raised $26.5 billion in July, in the largest US first-time share sale by a foreign company.

The divorce would bring an end to a long-running feud that began to publicly unravel in 2015 when Chey revealed he had a child with another woman. A court in July ordered Chey to pay 944 billion won to his former wife Roh Soh-yeong, the daughter of a former president. Chey filed an appeal against the ruling.

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Chey will sell 544 billion won worth of shares to strategic investors and the rest through a price-return-swap deal with securities firms, SK said in a statement. He plans to pare his stake through an after-hours block trade instead of selling the shares all at once during market hours.

“In planning the sale, the largest shareholder comprehensively reviewed the transaction structure and scale to minimize the impact on the market and shareholders,” said SK, which controls the biggest holder in SK Hynix.

Chey is worth $5.9 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.