The family behind South Korea’s conglomerate Samsung has completed payment of a 12 trillion won (about £6 billion / $8 billion) inheritance tax bill, marking the largest such settlement in the country’s history.
The payment was made by Samsung Chairman Lee Jae-yong and other members of the Lee family, including Hong Ra-hee and sisters Lee Boo-jin and Lee Seo-hyun, over six instalments spanning the past five years.
The tax obligation is linked to the estate of the late Samsung chairman Lee Kun-hee, who passed away in October 2020, leaving behind an estimated fortune of around 26 trillion won in assets, including shares, real estate, and valuable art collections.
Samsung confirmed that the final instalment has now been completed, noting that the total amount paid is equivalent to roughly one and a half times South Korea’s entire inheritance tax revenue for 2024.
South Korea imposes one of the highest inheritance tax rates globally at 50%, and the settlement had been closely monitored due to concerns it could impact the Lee family’s control over the Samsung empire.
Despite the scale of the tax burden, the family previously stated that paying taxes is a “natural duty of citizens.”
A portion of Lee Kun-hee’s estate, including artworks by Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dalí, was donated to national museums and cultural institutions in South Korea.
The Lee family’s combined wealth is estimated at over $45 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, and has recently increased significantly due to rising demand for semiconductor products driven by the global artificial intelligence industry.
Samsung Group, founded in 1938 by Lee Byung-chul, operates across multiple sectors including electronics, heavy industry, construction, and financial services, and remains one of the world’s most influential conglomerates.
