<Anchor> When



asked to invest in a crisis, many individual investors bought Russian-related financial products, which are leading to huge losses.

In addition, yesterday (the 7th), rumors of a bankruptcy originating from Russia increased, raising concerns about whether the global economy would freeze.



Reporter Im Tae-woo reports.



<Reporter>



After the Ukraine crisis, recommendations to buy Russian exchange-traded funds and ETFs poured out on the Internet, saying that you have to think in the opposite direction to make money.



[A YouTuber: Just as every crisis is an opportunity, Russian stocks are okay too...

.]



[B YouTuber: Of course, the deeper the valley, the greater the rise.

There are products that can be invested in Russian indices in Korean ETF products.]



Even though the price was cut in half as institutional investors poured out Russian ETFs, individuals went to the domestic and overseas stock markets to buy more than 70 billion won in two weeks.



However, the Russian ETF was eventually suspended from trading.



This is because the American company MSCI, which sets the standards for funds around the world, has assessed that the Russian stock price is 0 and has no value.



The investment management company believes that it may be delisted in the future, so the total investment of KRW 70 billion may disappear.



There are even rumors of bankruptcy from Russia.



An international financial crisis could occur as Russia, which has run out of dollars, declares that it will not be able to repay about 850 billion won of our government bonds due on the 16th.



[Philip Palumbo/CIO, Palumbo Asset Management: We are seeing World War III unfolding right before our eyes.

If it's not next year, I expect an economic downturn at the end of this year.]



Due to this crisis, the domestic stock market yesterday fell by more than 2% as foreigners and institutions poured in, and the won-dollar exchange rate soared.