Police arrest bid for BTS label Chairmain rejected by Korean prosecutors (report)
South Korean prosecutors have rejected a police request for an arrest warrant towards HYBE Chairman Bang Si-hyuk, simply days after officers utilized for his detention in reference to an investigation into alleged unfair buying and selling tied to the corporate’s 2020 IPO.
That’s in keeping with Yonhap Information Company, which experiences at the moment (April 24) that the Seoul Southern District Prosecutors’ Workplace declined the warrant request. Police had utilized for the warrant on costs of unfair buying and selling underneath the Capital Markets Act, the outlet reported.
“At this stage, there’s inadequate proof to justify the need of detention, and we have now due to this fact requested a supplementary investigation,” the prosecution mentioned, in keeping with Yonhap.
The choice got here after the monetary crimes unit of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Company utilized for an arrest warrant for Bang on Monday (April 21).
That warrant software itself adopted an announcement from Seoul Metropolitan Police Company Commissioner Park Jung-bo, who had informed reporters the day earlier than the warrant software that that the investigation into Bang was “basically full” and nearing conclusion, as reported by The Korea Herald.
Bang is accused of deceptive buyers in 2019 by telling them that HYBE (then referred to as Large Hit Leisure) had no plans to pursue an preliminary public providing, whereas the corporate was allegedly already present process pre-IPO procedures.
Traders reportedly bought their holdings to a non-public fairness fund based mostly on these assurances. In keeping with Yonhap, Bang is suspected of producing roughly 260 billion received (approx. $175 million) by way of the scheme.
Bang has denied the allegations. In keeping with Yonhap, he has mentioned the IPO adopted the regulation and laws.
When police utilized for the warrant on April 21, Bang’s authorized workforce, in a press release to the Related Press, expressed remorse that officers had been searching for his arrest “regardless of our full and constant cooperation with the investigation over an prolonged interval.”
Bang has reportedly been underneath a journey ban since August 2025 and was summoned by police twice for questioning in September of that 12 months. He returned to Seoul from the USA in August 2025 to face questioning, telling workers on the time that he felt “a deep sense of remorse” that the scenario could be affecting HYBE’s artists and staff.
As beforehand reported, Bang and three different executives had been referred to prosecutors in July 2025 by regulators for a probe into alleged unfair buying and selling related to the IPO.
The case stays underneath investigation. Prosecutors have requested that police conduct additional evidence-gathering.
Korean media reported just lately that the US Embassy in Seoul had despatched a letter to the police company requesting that Bang and different HYBE executives be permitted to journey to the US, citing BTS’s ARIRANG world tour – the US leg of which opens in Tampa later this month – and July 4th celebrations.
HYBE denied involvement within the embassy letter, saying it had “not requested the US Embassy to hunt the lifting of Chairman Bang’s journey ban”.Music Enterprise Worldwide
