A South Korean court has ordered gaming tycoon Kwon Hyuk-bin to pay his ex-wife 2.55 trillion won ($1.87bn; £1.38bn), the largest divorce settlement in the country's history. Kwon founded Smilegate, South Korea's third-largest video game company, and is one of the nation's wealthiest men, with Bloomberg estimating his net worth at $3bn; the ruling breaks up his full ownership of the firm and sets a new benchmark for divorce payouts in South Korea.

The court ruled that a 35% stake in Smilegate, worth around 2.5 trillion won, be transferred to his ex-wife Lee Hwa-jin, along with an additional 65 billion won in cash, after she had sought a 50% share on the grounds she helped finance the company and raised their children for over 20 years. Kwon countered that Lee neither invested in nor worked for the business. The award more than doubles the previous record of 944 billion won set against SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won in July, a ruling later overturned by the Supreme Court due to a miscalculation; both parties in the Smilegate case retain the right to appeal.