2010년 12월 7일 화요일

글로웍스 (Gloworks ) KOSDAQ-listed stock 034600

On 2010-12-7, Gloworks recorded the #1 turnover of any equity on the KRX, trading 100,288,139 shares out of a total float of 171,602,880 shares. This is a turnover ratio of 58.44%, and they closed at 476 KRW (roughly $0.45) today, up 2.81%. I was curious about this company I had never heard before and visited their corporate site.

The company has a really interesting history. They used to be the music streaming service, "Bugs Music," which was famous (notorious) for providing foreign and domestic music tracks of almost all artists free of charge. Of course this was done without copyright, and after a settlement with domestic music firms about 3~4 years ago, the site changed over to a subscription/pay model. Due to the web-centric nature of music piracy in Korea and the weakness of domestic P2P alternatives (SoriBada was a popular domestic P2P network that was shut down by the courts and Korean record labels; it failed to gain traction in its legal, pay-format reincarnation) Bugs maintained its popularity and was able to survive as a subscriber-only service.

In 2007 they changed their name from Bugs Interactive to Gloworks and embarked on a totally different business model--hard asset investments in Mongolia and Kazahkstan!!! As of 2009, they began developing a gold mine in Mongolia as well as an apartment complex in Kazahkstan. 

They are essentially a penny stock, and according to information from KOSCOM, most of the turnover is due to individual investors trading through 키움증권.