BTS members to hold billions in shares of Big Hit Entertainment

BTS poses for photos prior to the online press conference held on Wednesday morning to share its thoughts on having reached No. 1 on Billboard's Hot 100 singles chart for the first time. [BIG HIT ENTERTAINMENT]

While its agency Big Hit Entertainment readies to go public on Korea's Kospi market this October, a securities registration statement handed in by the agency on Wednesday states that members of BTS will hold billions of won worth of shares once the company goes public.

According to the registration papers, executive director and head of Big Hit Entertainment, Bang Si-hyuk, gave 478,695 shares to BTS, to be shared equally among the seven members; each member will be allotted 68,385 shares.

Big Hit Entertainment announced its official plans on Wednesday, reporting that it will publicly offer 7.13 million shares to raise between 748.7 billion won ($630.8 million) and 962.6 billion won.

If the price of a share is set at the highest estimated range of between 105,000 won to 135,000 won, then BTS will hold 64.6 billion won worth of shares — 9.2 billion won each.

According to the Financial Supervisory Service's Data Analysis, Retrieval and Transfer System, the estimated market capitalization of Big Hit Entertainment is set between 3.7 trillion won and 4.8 trillion won.

Even the lowest estimate is larger than the total sum of market capital of the three biggest entertainment agencies in Korea: JYP Entertainment with 1.3 trillion won, YG Entertainment with 920 billion won and SM Entertainment with 875 billion won, making a total of 3.1 trillion won.

While industry insiders say that Big Hit Entertainment is likely to face an optimistic scenario, as BTS just became the first ever K-pop band to top the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart this week with its latest single, "Dynamite," the agency pinpointed some factors that worry potential investors such as whether BTS will remain successful in the future.

"We have extended our exclusive contract with BTS until the end of 2024, and Kim Seok-jin [also known as Jin], who is the oldest of the group, can postpone his enlistment for his mandatory military duty until the end of 2021," the agency said through the registration report.

Meanwhile, BTS officially broke three new Guinness World Records with "Dynamite," which now holds the records for the most viewed YouTube video in 24 hours, the most viewed YouTube music video in 24 hours and the most viewed YouTube music video in 24 hours by a K-pop group.

BY YOON SO-YEON [yoon.soyeon@joongang.co.kr]