BTS's agency Big Hit, the best performance ever in the pandemic

 Big Hit Entertainment, the agency of BTS, achieved the highest performance ever last year despite the aftermath of the novel coronavirus infection (Corona 19).

Big Hit announced on the 23rd that the consolidated operating profit for last year was 142.4 billion won, a 44.2% increase from the previous year (97.8 billion won). Sales increased 35.6% from the previous year (587.2 billion won) to 7963 billion won. Net profit increased 19% to 86.2 billion won. In the fourth quarter, operating profit was KRW 52.5 billion and sales were KRW 3123 billion, up 122.3% and 116.9% from the same period last year. This is also the highest level since its inception in quarterly results, Big Hit said.

◆Although it was not possible to perform, album sales↑

Big Hit explained that performance (offline) sales fell sharply due to Corona 19 last year, but sales were driven by strong album sales and even growth in the business sector. Last year's performance division sales were 3.4 billion won, down 98% from the previous year (191.1 billion won). This is because it was virtually impossible to hold offline performances, such as most of the tours of the artists belonging to BTS, including BTS, were canceled.

An official from Big Hit explained at the performance conference call that "the total of 60 or more scheduled world tours by some artists during the year 2020 would have resulted in more than 200 billion won in performance sales from canceled performances." did.

Album sales grew 196% year-on-year to KRW 326.2 billion. Artists belonging to Big Hit labels such as BTS, Seventeen, Tomorrow by Together, and N Hyphen were counted to have sold a total of 13.22 million albums (based on Gaon Chart) last year. Their record sales share in the Korean market last year was 33%.

◆ Various revenue channels such as MD also contributed

Official product (MD) and licensing sales increased by about 53% from 169.9 billion won in 2019 to 259.1 billion won last year.

Content sales through online concerts recorded 133.5 billion won, up 71% from the previous year.

Fan club-related sales also increased by 66% to 32.9 billion won. Fan community platform Weverse recorded about 25 million cumulative app downloads as of February this year.

Big Hit classifies albums, performances, advertisements, and appearance fees as'direct participation type' sales for artists, and businesses such as MD/licensing, contents, and fan clubs as 'indirect participation type' sales. Participatory type accounted for 53%.

Big Hit has recently decided to launch a new K-pop platform by integrating Naver's VLive and Weverse, which is expected to strengthen its global market competitiveness. There is also a plan to debut a global boy group through Universal Music Group (UMG) and US auditions.