The nominee to co-head Kakao Corporation, the operator of the nation's top mobile messenger KakaoTalk, has resigned amid controversy over his massive stock selloffs.

According to the company on Monday, its board of directors decided to accept the resignation of Ryu Young-joon as co-CEO, after gathering opinions from company executives and employees.

Currently the chief of Kakao's payment arm, Kakao Pay, Ryu was named to lead the tech giant alongside incumbent co-CEO Yeo Min-soo on November 25.

About a month after taking Kakao Pay public, Ryu and several other senior executives exercised their stock options on December 10, selling around 90 billion won worth of shares and collecting profit of some 46-point-nine billion won.

The selloffs eventually led to Kakao Pay's stock price plunging from 208-thousand-500 won on December 9 to 148-thousand-500 won as of Monday.

Ryu, however, will remain the chief of Kakao Pay until his term ends in March.