(FORTUNE Magazine) – CEOs often go to extremes to save a company, but few have gone as far as Samsung's Lee Kun Hee. In October, the eccentric 57-year-old chairman of this sprawling South Korean conglomerate said he would pay $2 billion of his own money to satisfy Samsung's creditors. Korea's new government has said it wants executives to take responsibility for their actions, and since it was Lee's decision to start the now bankrupt Samsung Motors in a market already glutted with carmakers, he's reaching into his own pocket. He can certainly afford to: He and his immediate family will still have an estimated net worth of $5.6 billion.

Lee's generosity, though, has stirred controversy. To pay his creditor banks the $2 billion, the chairman will use four million of his personal shares in Samsung Life Insurance, which is private but plans a public offering next year. The company says its financial advisers at the firm Samil-Price Waterhouse value its shares at $583 each, enough to cover the automaker's debt to banks. But a report by the government's Financial Supervisory Commission indicates that a private company controlled by Lee's son Jae-Yong purchased 3.44 million shares of Samsung Life last year for only $7.50 each. Korean authorities are investigating whether that deal was designed to evade inheritance taxes.

Samsung denies wrongdoing. One of its executives explains: "Like other Korean companies, Samsung Life Insurance faced severe financial difficulties last year when the whole Korean economy was reeling from the aftershock of the Asian financial crisis." So its stock price, calculated on a conservative basis recommended by Korean tax authorities, was low. Adds the manager: "No one could foretell that the Korean equivalent of the Dow Jones index would shoot up from 300 points last year to a record-high 1,050 points this past summer. Samsung Life is on a fast recovery track, and the higher stock price evaluation reflects this dramatic financial improvement." That may be, but the Korean market only rose 250%; Samsung Life stock jumped 7,670%.

--Louis Kraar