SM Entertainment’s Strong Earnings Place It Atop Music Stocks In Down Week Overall

SM Entertainment’s second quarter earnings, which were announced Wednesday (Aug. 2), helped shares of the K-pop music company, home to such acts as NCT Dream and Red Velvet, gain 7.6% to 137,700 won ($105.59) this week. That made it the top performer of the 21 stocks in the Billboard Global Music Index this week.

The index fell 1.9% to 1,360.05 in a week in which stocks were broadly down around the world. In the United States, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq composite fell 2.3% and 2.8%, respectively, marking their worst weeks since March. The FTSE 100 in the United Kingdom declined 1.7%. South Korea’s KOSPI composite index declined 0.2%.

The return of the concert business helped SM Entertainment revenues grow 30% to 239.8 billion won ($184 million), beating the 20.3% year-over-year improvement in the first quarter of 2023. SM artists had 60 concerts in the second quarter compared to six in the prior-year period. Merchandise revenue jumped 75% from sales increases from pop-up retail stores related to album releases. The day before SM announced earnings, the company’s shares got a 3.1% boost from Tuesday’s announcement that it had combined its North American operations with the U.S. operations of Kakao Entertainment, which acquired a 40% stake in SM in March.

Most of the companies that reported earnings this week saw their share prices decline week-over-week, though. Believe dropped 5.4%, SiriusXM fell 5.5% and Deezer lost 7.1%. Shares of Reservoir Media were unchanged.

Another K-pop company, HYBE, was one of just five of the index’s 21 stocks in positive territory this week. Shares of HYBE, which will report second-quarter earnings on Tuesday (Aug. 8), improved 5.2% to 272,000 won ($208.58). iHeartMedia, which also reports earnings on Tuesday, gained 6.9%.