South Korea's Mastern Investment Management Adopts Stewardship Code, First Among Alternative Investment Firms, Publishes Annual Implementation Report

Mastern Investment Management, a South Korean asset manager specializing in alternative investments, said on October 30 that it has adopted the Stewardship Code, which sets out fiduciary duty principles for institutional investors, and completed registration as a signatory. The company described the step as preemptive, noting it is unusual for a large independent alternative manager centered on private equity, real estate and infrastructure, which are largely unlisted assets, to establish a public principles framework.

The firm's "Principles for Institutional Investors' Fiduciary Duties" set out its implementation framework, current status and future plans for each of the seven principles of the Korea Stewardship Code. These cover fiduciary duty policies, prevention of conflicts of interest, monitoring of investee assets, exercise of voting rights, reporting of implementation status and securing capabilities. Reflecting its alternative investment focus, Mastern specified a fiduciary approach spanning asset inspection, risk management and value enhancement across the full investment cycle, from acquisition through holding and management to disposal. The article notes this extends a stewardship framework designed mainly around voting on listed shares into life-cycle management of unlisted assets.

Mastern plans to publish a Fiduciary Duty Implementation Report annually, including voting-rights exercise and implementation status for managed assets, to strengthen investor communication. CEO Park Hyung-seok said, "Adopting the Stewardship Code is about systematizing, through the company's principles and procedures, our responsibility as a fiduciary managing assets entrusted to us by clients." He added that the firm would monitor implementation so that decisions in actual management align with the disclosed principles, and would transparently disclose results.

The Korea Stewardship Code was introduced in 2016 and has drawn pension funds, asset managers and insurers, but participation by alternative investment specialists has been relatively rare. Limited public pricing and limited voting rights for unlisted assets have made it difficult to demonstrate fulfillment of fiduciary duties, according to the report.

Industry observers see the adoption as a sign that South Korean institutional fiduciary duties are expanding from listed shares to alternatives. Overseas pension funds and global managers increasingly treat governance systems and responsibility-reporting frameworks as due-diligence items, so the disclosed principles and annual report may serve as reference materials in attracting foreign entrusted capital. Some caution that verification is still needed on whether the reported implementation results actually improve asset value and risk management, and that how performance metrics and disclosure scope are defined will be central to the system's credibility.