▲ Samduk / CEO Ohheong Gwon

Established in 1976, Samduk has grown to be one of the top five accounting firms at home. As of January 1, around 600 accountants and 300 staff members are working for the firm. Over 80% of them have more than 10 years of experience in the field. The firm’s average yearly sales growth is 30% and Samduk is ranked No.1 Asian accounting firm among the members of the Nexia International that is one of the world’s top 10 accounting networks boasting 250 member firms worldwide.

Ohheong Gwon, CEO of Samduk, has devoted 40 years of his life to accounting. All those years, he has kept two principles: transparency and rationality. He led introducing practices of ‘burden of proof’ and ‘proportional liability’. The burden of proof is now helping accountants distinguish between right and wrong when a legal battle with institutional investors occur. The proportional liability also has brought accountant’s liability of compensation according to the level of responsibility of the person involved, for example, in a company’s deliberate fraud of accounting. 

“Audit is like a regular health checkup of our body. It is regretful to see the bad practices of some companies put their audits on a bid. How can we give a proper checkup to the financial healthiness of a company if we have to compete each other to win the bid? Accountants who lost transparency and integrity, not to mention the companies, should not be trusted.” says Gwon.

He points out people’s misunderstanding about ‘qualified report’ given by an accountant firm to a company’s financial status. This is because people take it that this company has no risk of bankrupt and is sound in profits and dividend. ‘Qualified report’ actually means the company’s financial affairs were done based on its own standard and that is all nothing more. 

He also points out the current irrational regulation on inheritance and gift taxes. This is part of the reasons that companies go for a second accounting book to raise a secret fund. He emphasizes that it is important to remove what causes the bad practices at first hand and then followed by strict audits and measures. 

Gwon served as the 39th and 40th president of the Korean Institute of Certified Public Accountants and has worked as an auditor of the YWCA Korea and the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry. He also has taken notable positions in numerous organizations including the Administration Reform Committee of the National Tax Service and the Tax Reform Committee of the Ministry of Economy and Finance. <PowerKorea>