Hive, 1.2 trillion sales with goods alone...The fine for "refusal to return" is 3 million won.

Hive

Although Hive has earned more than 1.2 trillion won from selling goods (fan products) such as cheering sticks over the past three years, the amount of fines paid for the tyranny of power abuse, such as refusing the buyer's request for return, is only 3 million won, the survey showed.

According to the data received from Hive by Kang Yoo-jung of the Democratic Party of Korea, a member of the National Assembly's Culture, Sports and Tourism Committee on the 7th, Hive sold goods from 2021 to the first half of this year, achieving 1.208 trillion won in sales. This is close to 20% of the total sales (KRW 6.21 trillion) during the period.

Goods ranked third in the first half of this year's sales (1.1 trillion won) with 170 billion won (16.9%), following albums and music sources (395 billion won, 39.4%) and performances (188 billion won, 18.7%).

Among them, Hive received only 3 million won (0.000025%) or 1 out of 40,000 won after he refused the buyer's request for a fair return.

Earlier in August, the Fair Trade Commission issued a fine of 3 million won to Hive subsidiary Weverse and 2.5 million won to the mall operators of the other three companies, saying that SM Entertainment, JYP Entertainment, and YG Entertainment, including Hive, are engaged in such unfair activities.

Despite continuous sanctions and warnings from the government and public institutions, idol agencies, including Hive, have been constantly abusing their goods. In 2019, the FTC issued a corrective order to eight entertainment agencies, imposing a fine of 31 million won. Nevertheless, the number of consumer consultations related to entertainment agencies at the Korea Consumer Agency quadrupled over the past five years from 69 in 2019 to 283 in 2023.

Critics point out that the reason why idol goods are not improving is because of the government's soft sanctions compared to astronomical goods profits.

Representative Kang said, "Hive's fine is only a fraction of the astronomical sales made from the sale of goods. We need to come up with a plan to sanction the business of guts with the entertainment agency's fan spirit as a hostage," he said.

Reporter Lee Yu Na from Digital News Team.