In 2026 Q1, JYP Entertainment achieved the quarterly revenue of KRW 186.0 BN, increased by 32.1% year-over-year. Operating profit increased by 70.0% year-over-year to KRW 33.4 BN. Net profit decreased by 53.9% year-over-year to KRW 31.9 BN due to the high base effect of the one-off gain from the partial sale of DearU shares in 2025 Q1.
Despite the absence of new album releases from major artists, global tours and strategic enhancement of MD business drove the growth of overall revenue. Now, we will explain the revenue breakdown by segment in more detail.
MD revenue recorded significant growth to KRW 60.6 BN, an increase of 85.2% year-over-year. This was driven by TWICE's tour MD and city pop-ups linked with tour, online and offline MD for domestic concerts and fan meetings by Blue Garage, and NiziU's tour MD in Japan. Furthermore, collaboration MD projects were reflected, including the TWICE x BE@RBRICK collaboration, Bandai Namco collaboration in Japan such as Stray Kids' SKZOO Gacha and TWICE's Lovely Gacha.
As part of MD business diversification strategy, we have advanced the tour MD business model from relying solely on on-site concert MD sales to integrating the world-tour and pop-up stores, starting with the recent TWICE world tour. We also differentiated the product lineups between concert venues and pop-up stores, expanding our offerings into a wider variety of categories. The success of this strategy led to a substantial increase in MD sales across major cities in North America and Taiwan where Q1 concerts took place.
From Blue Garage, online sales for Stray Kids' October 2025 world tour encore concert MD and TWICE's 10th-anniversary domestic fan meeting pop-up were recognized in this quarter, as the delivery was fully completed. Additionally, Q1 revenue reflected DAY6's domestic concert MD and offline MD from Stray Kids' fan meeting, which began in late March. As online and offline MD sales of global mega IPs concentrated in Q1, Blue Garage's revenue increased 180.5% year-over-year to KRW 40.9 BN.
Management revenue growth was driven by TWICE's North America tour scale-up, early-stage artists tour lineup expansion, and record-high advertisement revenue.
Concert revenue recorded KRW 40.9 BN, an 88.7% increase year-over-year. Total of 29 shows were reflected including TWICE's 360-degree world tour across 14 North American cities and the Taipei Dome in Taiwan, 12 shows for DAY6's domestic and Asia arena tour, 3 shows for ITZY's world tour in Seoul, 7 shows for NMIXX's Europe and North America tour, and 12 shows for NiziU's Japan arena tour. While continued expansion of global core fandom increased the scale of each artist's world tour, early-stage artists’ tours were newly launched and further drove the growth.
Advertisement achieved its highest quarterly revenue of KRW 13.6 BN, an increase of 50.9% year-over-year. The growth was accompanied by the expansion of mega IPs’ global influence as well as the rising mass popularity of early-stage artists including NMIXX and KickFlip. Appearances revenue reflected 2 times of Stray Kids fan meetings and 12 shows of KickFlip domestic fan concerts but recorded KRW 5.3 BN, a 39.8% decrease year-over-year due to a reduction in scale compared to last year.
For the physical album, DAY6 Wonpil's solo mini album, ITZY Yuna's solo mini album, and TWICE MISAMO's Japanese album were released in Q1. Despite the absence of new albums from major artists, Stray Kids' album catalogues released last year continued to record strong sales in Western regions including North America and Europe. As a result, physical album revenue recorded KRW 25.2 BN, limiting the year-over-year decrease to 15.1%.
Streaming revenue recorded KRW 19.8 BN, a 32.0% increase year-over-year and this includes the impact of the reclassification of YouTube revenue. Starting this quarter, YouTube revenue was reclassified from Others to Streaming as it is a 'Visual Streaming Service' utilizing music IPs inserted in the videos.
In addition to fundamental improvement in the profit structure through strategic global MD optimization, the leverage from the expanded scale of TWICE North America world tour and the steady sales of Stray Kids' catalogues in the U.S. and Europe led to improved profitability. GPM improved 2.2%pt year-over-year to 38.9%, and OPM increased 4.0%pt to 17.9%.
Artist fee increased by 52.5% to KRW 52.3 BN, in line with the expansion of management revenue, which grew 51.5% year-over-year. Other expenses were KRW 36.3 BN. Despite an increase in product costs driven by Blue Garage's MD revenue growth, increase in other expenses was limited from economies of scale based on mega IPs and the efforts to fundamentally improve the profit structure, such as procurement process efficiency for direct cost improvement. Content production costs decreased 5.0% year-over-year to KRW 25.0 BN, reflecting production costs related to artists' new releases, catalogue albums, digital singles, and domestic concerts, while the number of new album releases declined compared to 2025 Q1.
Global leverage from major artists' albums and concerts as well as cost optimization in the MD business including SG&A expenses drove additional growth in the operating profit margin. Blue Garage achieved an OPM of 11.1% by improving its overall cost structure, including shipping fees through strategic renegotiation with partners.
We are successfully delivering strong MD contributions to both revenue and profitability, from strategic MD business enhancement starting last year. We will continue to lead top-line growth by diversifying sales channels and product categories and by strengthening global IP licensing, while concurrently driving fundamental improvement in profitability through Blue Garage's business structure optimization.
Starting with TWICE’s 6th world tour, we newly launched tour-linked city pop-up stores across 21 major cities worldwide. Following 5 cities in Asia and Australia in Q4 of last year, we successfully hosted pop-ups in 7 cities in North America and Taiwan in Q1 of this year. In Q2, city pop-ups are planned in 9 cities in North America, Japan, and Europe. In particular, we introduced differentiated product categories—such as exclusive items highlighting the unique characteristics of each city—that are different from traditional concert venue MD. Through these new strategic initiatives, MD sales for this tour substantially increased compared to the previous tour. We plan to expand this successful business model to the world tours of all our artists to further elevate MD business structure.
Furthermore, we are expanding MD business and IP licensing on a global scale, utilizing our core strength, artist character IPs. We launched the global SKZOO pop-up store project starting from Seoul in late April, and pop-up stores will be open sequentially across major cities worldwide. Each pop-up will offer a differentiated fan experience including character MD products that reflect the unique characteristics of each city. Additionally, we will strengthen local MD through partnerships in key regions such as the U.S., Japan, and China. We will also continue to expand global licensing collaborations for our character IPs—such as the gacha collaboration with Bandai in Japan.
Lastly, we will maximize the profitability of our subsidiary Blue Garage's ecommerce business. We will expand sales by diversifying product lineups available year round and by running various promotional events, while simultaneously continuing to optimize both COGS and SG&A expenses. We aim to continue MD COGS reduction activities including strengthening demand forecasting for efficient inventory management. We also aim to reduce global shipping lead time and costs by securing logistics hubs in major regions such as the U.S., China, and Europe. We plan to enhance payment convenience for global fans by adding supported payment currencies such as Chinese Yuan and Euro, and local payment methods to FANS SHOP. Through these various efforts, we will further enhance the global fan experience and maximize our global ecommerce competitiveness.
Next are major artists' activity plans and investment highlights.
We will continue to improve profitability through revenue leverage by solidifying the global influence of our key artists in Western markets. Despite the increase in costs driven by their expanded activities, Mega IPs are generating economies of scale based on the rapid growth of their Western fandoms, more than offsetting the cost burden and significantly contributing to robust profitability. Furthermore, early-stage artists are building their global fandom base rapidly. We are expecting company-wide growth from our artist management strategies tailored to each stage of the artist life-cycle.
2PM successfully completed their group concert at the Tokyo Dome last weekend. Even after 15 years since their Japan debut, they successfully completed 2 shows with 85,000 audiences, proving their solid core fandom as a legacy IP. In addition, they plan to hold 2 more group concerts at the Inspire Arena in Korea in August.
DAY6 is demonstrating their worldwide presence through the 10th-anniversary world tour <THE DECADE> in both domestic and overseas regions.Their tour sizes have expanded to an arena level which is exceptional for a domestic band group, demonstrating their strong potential for further global fandom growth. Additionally, member Wonpil recently sold out all 3 solo concerts at Jamsil Indoor Stadium, proving DAY6’s influence and ticket power across both group and solo activities.
TWICE is solidifying their influence through their ongoing 6th world tour. With a total of 550,000 audiences in North America alone during this tour, TWICE set a new record for the highest audiences for a K-pop girl group in the region. Additionally, in Japan, they became the first foreign artist to perform at the Tokyo National Stadium, selling out 3 consecutive shows with an audience size of 80,000 per show, and the total Japan audiences reached 640,000 during their <THIS IS FOR> tour. Furthermore, major city MD pop-ups held concurrently with the world tour achieved strong MD sales performance and continuous collaborations with major global IP companies such as Bandai Namco, further enhanced the business profit structure.
Stray Kids will continue their record-breaking achievements and expand global fandom base through new album and tour this year, following their largest world tour last year and Billboard 200 chart #1 achievement with 8 consecutive albums. Starting in late April in Seoul, global pop-up stores for their official character 'SKZOO' will be sequentially launched worldwide. The pop-up stores are scheduled to be held in major global cities, featuring SKZOO character MD that reflects the landmarks and characteristics of each location, and offering fans a unique regional experience. This year, in addition to new global album and tour, they plan to engage in diverse activities including performances at several global festivals as the first K-pop group.
ITZY successfully began their 3rd world tour in February in Seoul. During the tour, the performance of "That's a No No" gained significant attention, proving the strong potential of their catalogue, as the song entered Melon Top 100 and ranked #1 on the domestic popular music video daily chart. Building on this momentum, they plan to come back with their new mini album 'Motto' on May 18th, further solidifying their unique position as the 'Performance Queen.’
NMIXX released their 5th mini album 'Heavy Serenade' on May 11th, building on the success of their previous release 'Blue Valentine.' Moreover, in February, they became the first K-pop idol to perform at Latin America's largest music festivals in Chile and Brazil, capturing the local fandom with their performance capabilities and fluent communication in the local language. This achievement in Latin America will be a critical foundation for expanding their influence into the U.S. market in the future, as the LATAM market is the world's fastest-growing market according to the 2026 IFPI report. Especially with their ongoing world tour, NMIXX's growth in the global music market is expected to accelerate further.
KickFlip achieved their career high first-week sales with mini album 'My First Kick,' and demonstrated steep growth by ranking No.1 on music shows for the 2 consecutive times following their previous release. All members were credited on every track of the album, proving their self-producing capabilities as all-rounder artists. Having recently completed their first fan concert tour, KickFlip plans to focus on a core fandom building strategy to continue their sustainable growth.
Next are activity plans of our localized artists.
NiziU secured #1 on both Japan's Oricon Weekly Album Ranking and Weekly Combined Album Ranking with their second Japanese EP, ‘GOOD GIRL BUT NOT FOR YOU,’ released in April, and became the female artist with the most #1 on Oricon Weekly Combined Album Ranking chart. They recently completed an arena tour across 5 cities with 12 shows in Japan with a total of 120,000 attendees. They also plan to hold their 2nd dome tour with 4 shows in Osaka and Tokyo in June.
NEXZ demonstrated solid growth with the release of the single ‘Mmchk’ in April, achieving their first #1 on a music show and recording their highest first-week album sales since debut. Following their success in Korea, they are actively continuing local activities in Japan, including holding a live tour with a total of 4 shows in Tokyo and Osaka from May, and planning to release a local EP album in June. NEXZ will further focus on activities worldwide to increase their awareness both in global and Japan markets.
MODYSSEY, Mnet's 'Boys 2 Planet' Chinese project group, successfully debuted in April, and BOY STORY member Li Zihao was selected as a final member of the group. Their debut album sales reached 300,000 copies in the first week, ranking TOP 10 of all-time boy group debut albums. MODYSSEY is managed by ONECEAD, a joint venture between our Chinese subsidiary, Beijing Shinsung entertainment, and CJ ENM. Utilizing JYP's infrastructure and CJ ENM's promotion capabilities, MODYSSEY will actively continue their activities in South Korea, China, and Japan.
GIRLSET achieved a career high with their digital single ‘TWEAK,’ released in March. Right after the release, the number of U.S. streams on major music platforms such as Spotify and Apple Music doubled compared to their previous release. For the first time since their debut, they ranked No. 1 on the iTunes Top Songs chart in multiple regions, including Mexico and Chile. They also achieved their highest records by ranking No. 24 on the U.S. iTunes Top Songs chart and No. 18 on the Pop Songs chart. Furthermore, they are actively diversifying their artist activities, having successfully hosted 8 fan events in major U.S. cities such as New York and LA. This year, they are planning to continue digital single releases and fan engagement activities.
Next is the major albums and performances scheduled for 2026 Q2. The detailed album and performance schedules disclosed in this slide are based on information currently released through official social accounts and the media, and are subject to change with future announcements.