South Korea’s HYBE mentioned on Wednesday (Aug. 6) that its second quarter income rose 10.2% year-over-year to 705.6 billion KRW ($516.7 million), whereas working revenue jumped practically 30% of 65.9 billion KRW ($48.3 million) as a result of profitable international excursions and releases from a number of of its artists, together with BTS members Jin and j-hope.
Live performance and merchandise income rose by mid-double-digit percentages following excursions by SEVENTEEN, TOMORROW X TOGETHER and LE SSERAFIM within the first half of the 12 months. J-hope’s 33-show tour, Hope On The Stage, bought practically half 1,000,000 tickets from February to June, adopted by his headlining performance at Lollapalooza Germany. Jin’s 18-show run in 9 cities marked his first tour as a solo artist.
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HYBE executives mentioned that information of BTS members finishing their necessary army service in South Korea and regrouping drove month-to-month customers of its tremendous fan platform Weverse to an all-time excessive of 12 million customers, exhibiting that the boy band’s enduring success continues to be a fundamental driver for HYBE’s enterprise.
Income from recorded music gross sales, live shows, commercials and appearances, which HYBE lumps collectively as “artist direct involvement income”, rose by 5.7% year-over-year to 447.9 billion KRW ($328 million). Whereas income from recorded music fell by 8.4% to 228.6 billion KRW ($167.4 million) year-over-year as a result of decrease vinyl gross sales, income from live shows was up 31% to 188.7 billion KRW ($138.2 million). Earnings from HYBE artists’ promoting and appearances rose by practically 1% to 30.6 billion KRW ($22.4 million).
Main releases within the quarter included Jin’s EP Echo, which reached No. 3 on the Billboard 200; j-hope & GloRilla’s single “Killin’ It Lady,” which reached No. 40 on the Billboard Hot 100; SEVENTEEN’s HAPPY BURSTDAY, which was among the many highest promoting albums within the first half of 2025 in Korea; ENHYPEN’s mini album DESIRE: UNLEASH, which reached No. 3 on the Billboard 200; and ILLIT‘s third mini album bomb.
Income from segments artists aren’t immediately concerned with — together with official merchandise, mental property licensing, content material and fan membership memberships — totaled 257.8 billion KRW ($188.8 million), with merchandise and licensing income leaping a whopping 40% to 152.9 billion KRW ($112 million). Fan membership income rose 46% to a record-high 34.6 billion KRW ($25.3 million).
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Although it doesn’t get away Weverse’s financials, HYBE executives mentioned income for Weverse rose 41% within the second quarter in comparison with the primary quarter. The platform averaged 10.9 million month-to-month energetic customers (MAUs) within the quarter.
HYBE CEO Lee Jae-sang spent a number of minutes on a name discussing earnings to handle the restructuring of its HYBE America operations. In July, the corporate named Isaac Lee, beforehand chairman of HYBE America and chairman of Latin America, as CEO of HYBE America, taking up from Scooter Braun, who transitioned to advisory and board director roles.
Lee mentioned the reorg was greater than a short-term change and grew out of a evaluation of the North America division’s previous 4 years.
“It’s about shifting our enterprise focus to label enterprise,” CEO Lee mentioned. “On condition that earnings from administration enterprise are inclined to fluctuate relying on the extent of actions by artists, we want to strengthen the label enterprise to generate steady earnings based mostly on streaming, thereby enhancing profitability and enterprise fundamentals.”
The transfer flattens administration of HYBE’s America and Latin America operations, with the purpose of connecting its operations in each locations “to additional strengthen and broaden [HYBE’s] international enterprise.”