This Boy Band Is About to Get Very Rich

IPO will make members of K-pop group BTS multi-millionaires
By Arden Dier,  Newser Staff
Posted Sep 29, 2020 1:07 PM CDT
Biggest South Korean IPO in Years Involves a Boy Band
BTS arrives at the 62nd annual Grammy Awards in Los Angeles on Jan. 26, 2020.   (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)

All seven members of K-pop sensation BTS are about to become multi-millionaires. The band's label, Big Hit Entertainment, plans to go public on Oct. 15 with a market valuation of $4.1 billion—making this South Korea's largest IPO in three years, per the Hollywood Reporter. The BBC reports demand is "1,000 times higher than the available stock," with die-hard fans hoping to nab at least one share. Big Hit founder Bang Si-hyuk, who owns 43% of the label, will immediately become a billionaire.

But BTS members are sitting pretty, too. As BTS was responsible for 97% of the label's sales in 2019 and 88% in the first half of this year, Bang has given 68,385 shares to each member: Kim Tae-hyung (known as V), Jung Ho-seok (J-Hope), Kim Nam-joon (RM), Kim Seok-jin (Jin), Park Ji-min (Jimin), Jeon Jung-kook (Jungkook) and Min Yoon-gi (Suga). Under the current valuation, those shares are now worth nearly $8 million, per the Reporter. The band is to release a new album in November, per CNN. (This is their first song in English.)

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