That total revenue haul for FY 2025 converts to USD $1.86 billion<\/strong> at the average annual exchange rate.<\/p>\n While HYBE’s topline grew strongly, the company’s profitability cratered. Operating profit fell 72.9% YoY<\/strong><\/span> to just 49.9 billion South Korean won (USD $35.1m)<\/strong>, with the company’s operating margin shrinking from 8.2%<\/strong> in FY 2024 to just 1.9%<\/strong> in FY 2025.<\/p>\n HYBE’s EBITDA in 2025 was 154 billion South Korean won (USD $108.3m)<\/strong>, down 47.0% YoY<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n The biggest growth driver for HYBE in 2025 was its Concerts<\/strong> business, which generated 763.9 billion South Korean won (USD $537.5m)<\/strong>, up 69.4% YoY<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Executives on HYBE’s earnings call on Thursday confirmed that the company achieved its highest-ever annual concert revenues in 2025.<\/p>\n Notably, HYBE’s concert revenues nearly matched its recorded music revenues in 2025.<\/p>\n The company’s Concerts business (763.9bn KRW) was just 9 billion South Korean won<\/strong> short of its Recorded Music revenues (773.0bn KRW) \u2013 a dramatic shift from 2023, when recorded music (970.5bn KRW) generated nearly three times as much revenue as concerts (359.1bn KRW). With the BTS World Tour ARIRANG<\/strong> set to launch in April 2026, concerts could overtake recorded music as a revenue line in the year ahead.<\/p>\n HYBE staged 279 concerts across 53 cities<\/strong> in 2025 with 12 touring artists<\/strong> \u2013 up from 172 concerts with 10 touring artists in 2024.<\/p>\n Major tours in the year included SEVENTEEN’s ‘Right Here New-Warning Tour’ (49 shows in 22 cities), Tomorrow X Together’s ‘ACT : PROMISE ACT : TOMORROW’ tour (40 shows in 21 cities), LE SSERAFIM’s ‘EASY CRAZY HOT’ tour (29 shows in 19 cities), and ENHYPEN’s ‘Walk The Line’ tour (26 shows in 16 cities). Solo BTS members j-hope and Jin also toured, with j-hope’s ‘Hope On The Stage’ tour spanning 33 shows in 16 cities, making him the first Korean solo artist to perform at North American stadiums.<\/p>\n HYBE also revealed details of the upcoming BTS World Tour ARIRANG<\/strong>, which will see the K-Pop supergroup perform 82 shows in 34 cities across 23 countries<\/strong> \u2013 described as the largest-ever stadium world tour since 2022 and a record for the most shows in K-Pop history. The tour will expand into 14 new cities including Madrid, Brussels, Munich, Buenos Aires, Lima, and Toronto.<\/p>\n HYBE’s Artist Direct-Involvement<\/strong> business, its largest revenue line, generated 1.684 trillion South Korean won (USD $1.18bn)<\/strong> in 2025, up 16.4% YoY<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n However, HYBE’s Recorded Music<\/strong> revenues fell 10.2% YoY<\/strong><\/span> to 772.96 billion South Korean won (USD $543.7m)<\/strong>, down from 860.96 billion won in 2024.<\/p>\n The company’s Artist Indirect-Involvement<\/strong> business \u2013 which sees HYBE use the name and likeness of its artists without requiring their active participation \u2013 generated 965.8 billion South Korean won (USD $679.3m)<\/strong>, up 19.3% YoY<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n Within that segment, Merchandising and licensing<\/strong> was the standout performer, growing 35.8% YoY<\/strong> <\/span>to 570.6 billion South Korean won (USD $401.4m)<\/strong>.<\/p>\n HYBE has also broken down the streaming revenues generated in 2025 by its Korea-based labels and US-based labels including Big Machine Label Group and QC.<\/p>\n According to HYBE, its US-based labels, including Big Machine Label Group and QC, generated a combined 117 billion South Korean won (USD $82.3m)<\/strong> in streaming revenue in 2025 versus 128 billion<\/strong> won in 2024.<\/p>\n The company’s Korea-based labels generated 107 billion South Korean won (USD $75.3m)<\/strong> in international streaming revenue in 2025, down from 126 billion won in 2024.<\/p>\n HYBE’s domestic streaming revenues for its South Korea-based labels reached 33 billion South Korean won (USD $23.2m)<\/strong> in 2025, down from 35 billion<\/strong> won in 2024.<\/p>\n According to Spotify, BTS<\/strong> was the most-streamed K-Pop artist globally in 2025, followed by Stray Kids, JENNIE, Ros\u00e9, and HUNTR\/X.<\/p>\n Among K-Pop songs, Ros\u00e9 and Bruno Mars’ ‘APT.’ was the most-streamed track, followed by Kpop Demon Hunters’ ‘Golden’ and Jimin’s ‘Who’.<\/p>\n In recorded music, Stray Kids<\/strong> was HYBE’s biggest album seller in South Korea in 2025, according to data from the Circle Chart, with their album KARMA<\/em> achieving 3.4 million<\/strong> sales. SEVENTEEN’s HAPPY BURSTDAY<\/em> was the second biggest seller with 2.56 million<\/strong> units.<\/p>\n In the US CD album sales chart (per Luminate’s 2025 Year-End Music Report), HYBE artists claimed multiple positions, with Stray Kids’ Karma<\/em> (524,000) and Do It<\/em> (456,000) at Nos. 2 and 3, behind only Taylor Swift’s The Life of a Showgirl<\/em> (1.957m). ENHYPEN’s Desire: Unleash<\/em> placed at No. 4 with 261,000 units.<\/p>\n In Japan’s Oricon Albums Ranking, SEVENTEEN’s HAPPY BURSTDAY<\/em> placed at No. 3, &TEAM’s Yukiakari<\/em> at No. 4, and ENHYPEN’s DESIRE:UNLEASH<\/em> at No. 9.<\/p>\n Looking at HYBE’s Q4 2025 specifically, quarterly revenue was 716.4 billion South Korean won (USD $503.8m)<\/strong>, down 1.4% YoY<\/strong><\/span> and 1.5% QoQ<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Q4 operating profit was 4.6 billion South Korean won (USD $3.2m)<\/strong>, down 92.9% YoY<\/strong><\/span>, but representing a return to profit on a sequential basis after HYBE posted an operating loss of 42.2 billion won in Q3 2025.<\/p>\n HYBE’s Q4 EBITDA was 32.1 billion South Korean won (USD $22.6m)<\/strong>, down 64.4% YoY<\/strong><\/span> but also turning a profit versus a negative EBITDA of 16.8 billion won in Q3.<\/p>\n The company’s Artist Direct-Involvement<\/strong> revenues fell 9.6% YoY<\/strong> in Q4 to 436.3 billion won<\/strong>, driven by a 13.4% YoY<\/strong><\/span> decline in Recorded Music revenues to 218.0 billion won<\/strong> and a 7.3% YoY<\/strong><\/span> drop in Concert revenues to 175.1 billion won<\/strong>.<\/p>\n However, HYBE’s Artist Indirect-Involvement<\/strong> business grew 14.9% YoY<\/strong> <\/span>in Q4 to 280.1 billion won<\/strong>, buoyed by a 61.0% YoY<\/strong><\/span> surge in Contents revenues to 100.6 billion won<\/strong> and a 21.5% YoY<\/strong> <\/span>increase in Fan club revenues to 36.7 billion won<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Q4 operating expenses were 711.9 billion South Korean won<\/strong>, up 7.6% YoY<\/strong> <\/span>but down 7.5% QoQ<\/strong>.<\/p>\n HYBE’s Q4 net loss, however, was 274.5 billion South Korean won (USD $193.1m)<\/strong> \u2013 significantly wider than the 52.0 billion won net loss posted in Q3.<\/p>\n When HYBE reported its Q3 results in November, CEO Jason Jaesang Lee<\/strong> said he anticipated “profitability headwinds will largely clear by the fourth quarter, allowing for the full-scale improvement of our revenue structure starting in 2026.”<\/p>\n On the operating line, HYBE did deliver on that promise \u2013 swinging from a 42.2 billion won operating loss in Q3 to a 4.6 billion won operating profit in Q4, with operating expenses falling 7.5% QoQ. However, the sharp widening of the net loss in Q4 suggests significant non-operating charges weighed on the company’s bottom line in the period.<\/p>\n Separately, HYBE’s superfan platform Weverse reported monthly active users of 11.2 million<\/strong> in Q4 2025, according to the company’s investor presentation.<\/p>\n That was up from 9.4 million in Q4 2024, though down by 400,000<\/strong> from a quarterly peak of 11.6 million<\/strong> in Q3 2025.<\/p>\n Earlier this week, HYBE published Weverse’s 2025 Fandom Trend Report, which revealed the platform hit a peak of 12 million MAUs<\/strong> during the year \u2013 a milestone reached following BTS’s full-group reunion in June, which the company said sparked a 300%-plus surge<\/strong> in new community followers month over month.<\/p>\n According to the report, fans spent an average of 263 minutes per month<\/strong> on Weverse in 2025, while artists hosted 6,558 Weverse LIVE sessions<\/strong> over the course of the year, amassing more than 1 billion views<\/strong> in total. Weverse Shop sold 25.2 million products<\/strong> in 2025, while digital product purchases more than doubled YoY.<\/p>\n There are now 178 artists<\/strong> active on the platform.<\/p>\n All KRW-USD currency conversions in this report have been calculated at the average annual exchange rate published by the IRS in the United States.<\/em><\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" South Korea-based entertainment giant HYBE has published its Q4 and FY 2025 earnings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":251015,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-251003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-analysis","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=251003"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251003\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":252915,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251003\/revisions\/252915"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/251015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=251003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=251003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=251003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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