Seoul, South Korea. Photo Credit: Mathew Schwartz
CT Investments has officially launched an exchange-traded fund (ETF) called KPOP and Korean Entertainment, which is designed to enable K-pop’s notoriously dedicated supporters to back the space’s foremost publicly traded companies.
CT Investments, which arrived on the scene earlier this year, debuted the KPOP and Korean Entertainment ETF on the NYSE Arca today. Moreover, CT is a wholly owned asset-management subsidiary of two-year-old Contents Technologies, which bills itself as a “next-generation content company that builds and invests in IPs as well as technology/finance/service-oriented businesses within the content value chain.”
For additional context, Contents Technologies “currently acquires and manages one of the largest portfolios of music copyrights and neighboring rights in South Korea,” the entity’s formal release elaborates, “and has made strategic investments across music production, music tech, creator economy, VFX, Web3, and gaming.”
Bearing in mind these points, the KPOP and Korean Entertainment ETF, which trades under the ticker KPOP, aims to provide investors with pre-fee results that “correspond generally to the total return performance of the KPOP Index.” Said Index, the ETF’s website indicates, is a 30-stock collection of companies listed on the Korea Exchange.
Just in case the targeted group isn’t yet clear, the ETF’s website proceeds to proclaim: “It is time for fandom to directly contribute to the K-pop industry beyond culture. If fans directly participate in its investment and speak out, K-pop will be able to maintain and grow in a healthier and more desirable direction.”
According once again to the KPOP and Korean Entertainment ETF’s website, the project’s largest Index holdings at present include 156 shares in Hybe (traded as 352820), 280 shares in Seoul’s CJ ENM (035760), 441 shares in JYP Entertainment (035900), and 111 shares in Naver Corp (035420), respectively.
During its first day on the NYSE Arca, KPOP dipped slightly to $19.71. Moving forward, it’ll be interesting to see whether the ETF catches on with K-pop fanatics, especially as their favorite acts continue to grow globally and in South Korea.
On the former front, full-scale K-pop stadium festivals are now taking place in the United States, where Universal Music Group and the aforementioned BTS agency Hybe are developing a new girl group as well as a boy band. Meanwhile, SM Entertainment and AmazeVR have partnered to bring fans virtual-reality concerts from “mega K-pop stars,” and the 2022 edition of Europe’s largest K-pop festival commenced with a livestream in place so that international fans could watch.
And in South Korea, the (purportedly separated) BTS has agreed to perform in Busan to try and bring the 2030 world’s fair to the city, while construction has already kicked off on the Seoul Arena, a K-pop venue that’s expected to open in (or before) 2025.