Enthusiasts of K-pop band BTS were being still left heartbroken on Monday when it was introduced the group’s customers had been established to serve in the South Korean army, this means no new excursions or songs for several decades.
Having said that, the seven members’ conscription—which Seoul permitted them to defer in 2020—could also come with an financial charge.
Due to the fact releasing their initially album 9 a long time in the past, the Grammy-nominated boyband—comprised of associates RM, Jin, SUGA, j-hope, Jimin, V, and Jung Kook—has tested its price as an economic powerhouse as properly as a triumph of the leisure marketplace.
By the numbers
In 2018, researchers at the Hyundai Exploration Institute claimed BTS had been contributing more than $3.6 billion to the South Korean overall economy every year—equivalent to the contribution of 26 mid-sized businesses.
Scientists also reported the boyband brought in a single in just about every 13 holidaymakers who frequented South Korea in 2017, and created an approximated $1.1 billion from client items exports like merchandise and cosmetics in a single calendar year.
Involving 2014 and 2023, analysts projected BTS would have contributed $29.1 trillion to the South Korean economic climate.
The band’s business success has also lined the pockets of its members. Collectively, BTS experienced a web worth of $50 million by 2020, in accordance to Forbes.
BTS and the marketplaces
As properly as contributing wealth to South Korea, the group has verified its means to rock the country’s fiscal markets.
BTS’s hiatus announcement back in June noticed shares of its management firm HYBE shed a quarter of their price, with the stock slipping to its least expensive since the company went general public two many years previously.
Information of the band members’ military conscription on Monday sent shares of HYBE 2.5% decreased.
The band, which was the 1st K-pop team to arrive at no. 1 on the Billboard 200, mentioned in a assertion introduced by label Major Strike Music on Monday that its members were being “honored to serve” their nation and would reconvene as a team “around 2025.”
Indication up for the Fortune Features e-mail listing so you never overlook our major capabilities, exclusive interviews, and investigations.