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Police seek to raid HYBE's headquarters in chairman's fraud investigation

Published: 29 May. 2025, 21:20

YOON SO-YEON
[email protected]

Bang Si-hyuk, founder and chairman of HYBE, at a conference held in Seoul on Feb. 20 [NEWS1]

HYBE is in deep trouble. Police have applied for a warrant to search HYBE's headquarters regarding founder and chairman Bang Si-hyuk's alleged fraud, having recently raided the same headquarters in an investigation of employee insider trading.

The Korea Economic Daily reported that the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency has requested a search warrant for the agency's offices. Founder and chairman Bang has been accused of lying to shareholders and convincing them to sell their HYBE shares to a private equity firm founded by his personal acquaintance.

In fact, this is the second time that police have applied for a search warrant as part of the investigation of HYBE. The first request was filed on April 30 but rejected, so police made another request after further investigation, according to the report.

The Korea Economic Daily reported Wednesday that the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) has gathered evidence that Bang lied to HYBE shareholders in 2019 before the company went public on the Korea Exchange and that it will fast-track the case to prosecutors once its investigation concludes.

Prosecutors' raid was targeted at a separate case where one of HYBE's employees allegedly used insider knowledge that Big Hit Entertainment, the previous name of HYBE, was going to invest in YG Plus in January 2021 to make some 240 million won ($175,000) by buying the stock in advance.

The employee was in charge of HYBE's finances, according to a report by SBS.

The news comes two days after HYBE announced that it will sell all of its 9.4 percent stake in SM Entertainment to China's Tencent for 200 billion won.

HYBE said it will release 2,212,237 shares of SM Entertainment, which represents a 9.38 percent stake in the company, in a regulatory filing on Tuesday.

BY YOON SO-YEON [[email protected]]