Good morning, and good evening. First of all, thank you all for joining this conference call. Now, we'll begin the Conference of the Fiscal Year 2025 Fourth Quarter Earnings Results by CJ ENM. This conference will start with a presentation followed by a divisional Q&A session. If you have a question, please press asterisk and one, that is asterisk one on your phone during the Q&A. Now, we shall commence the presentation on the Fiscal Year 2025 Fourth Quarter Earnings Results by CJ ENM.
Good afternoon. This is Hong Seong-woo from CJ ENM's IR team. I thank the shareholders and analysts for their participation in this earnings session, despite their busy schedule. Now, we will commence Fourth Quarter 2025 Results presentation of CJ ENM. Please note that the financial and management results presented today have yet to undergo an independent auditor's review and could be subject to changes upon such review. Today, we have with us Jin-young Kim from Finance, and Shin Keum-soep from Strategy and Planning and Heads of different business divisions.
We have from Platform, Nam-ju Lee, from Film, Miss Hyang-ju Chung, from Content Distribution, Do-hyung Kim, from Global, Jun-yeop Kim. Music is represented by Young-ju Ok and Miss Seo-hyeong Oh. Or from Commerce, we have Jin-wook Seo. From Studio Dragon, we have Miss Hye-mi Lee. From TVING, we have Hyung-kyung Chang, and from CJ ENM Studios, we have CEO Ha Seok-soo . First, there will be presentations on major results and business strategies.
Good afternoon, this is Jin-young Kim from Finance. In 2025, the company saw tangible results of global expansion together with strength and competitiveness that comes from business model enhancement. First, on content. CJ ENM's content ranked number one in 2025 FUNdex ranking for 27 weeks. Major dramas and non-scripted entertainment programs recorded outstanding results and high popularity. Out of 10 best K-dramas of 2025, selected by U.S. TIME, five were streamed on TVING. His & Hers, produced and delivered by Fifth Season last year, was ranked as number one global TV show on Netflix after its release earlier this year. The company realized a diversification of profit model, which starts from pre-planning, fan meetings to good sales, that enables multifaceted, long-tailed profit generation with strategic IP design, as was demonstrated with "Bon Appétit, Your Majesty", "Marry My Husband", the Japanese Amazon original drama, recorded top ratings ever in 2025.
Many other dramas were produced and aired this way, cementing our global production capabilities. With enhanced daily content and platform services, TVING's AVOD subscriber number increased, and advertisement revenue grew 84% YOY. The company secures a firm position as a key content global hub for HBO Max Southeast Asia and Disney+ branded zone services.
Mnet Plus [Foreign language]
Mnet Plus established content-based ad, Plus Chat, and album MD business model, and with that, saw a rapid growth of Q4 average MAU of 470% compared to Q1. The platform confirmed its potential with 2025 revenue witnessing an exponential growth of about 250% YOY.
[Foreign language]
Commerce is evolving into a trending platform with offline pop-up store and expanded marketing channels that covers SNS and OTT platforms, inviting new customer traffic centering on the MZ customers.
[Foreign language]
Thanks to collaborations with influencers and fandom commerce expansion with strength in short-form content, the company is seeing stronger mobile live content competitiveness. With the introduction of fast delivery, Baro delivery, and expanded specialized stores with faster delivery, the business is enhancing its services. Accordingly, MLC has grown 66%, continuing top line growth. Next is our midterm strategy after 2026.
[Foreign language]
CJ ENM will continue to grow its competitiveness with content platforms that gave us excellent results in 2025. And, with that, I have given you the major presentations for our results in 2025. And with that, now let's move on to talk about some strategies that will continue in year 2026.
[Foreign language]
Good afternoon, this is Keum-sub Shin from Strategy and Planning. CJ ENM will engage in the following strategy to transition into an IP and platform-centered business structure and to fully expand to global markets.
[Foreign language]
First, for content IP, the company will focus on developing global IP and securing rights. By expanding local production hubs centering on the U.S. and Japan, the company will evolve into a global content IP holder, who will enhance our competency as an entertainment company with stronger planning, production, management, and talent discovery functions. With global multi-label expansion, the company will expedite our artist business growth with MTS-based national and regional mega HIP.
[Foreign language]
TVING, in the digital platform space, will continue to discover representative mega IPs and offer innovative user experience and differentiated content with KBO broadcasting, shorts, and lives. The platform will enhance its status as a daily platform and will focus more on overseas expansion that started last year with branded zones.
[Foreign language]
Mnet Plus, our other platform, will see enhanced original content production targeting K-pop core fans, where the fan-directed product and services design will advance its business model and lay the foundation to grow as a global number one K-pop fandom-bound OTT platform.
[Foreign language]
Now on AI, which is the core technical factor in future content industry. The company will create new AI-based content in animation and movies, and by establishing a network comprised of entities from the public, private sectors, and the academia, will lead the AI ecosystem. The company will accelerate the adoption of AI in all production stages to enhance process and quality, and also reduce production costs.
[Foreign language]
Lastly, for commerce, the MLC business model will be strengthened with increased influencer pool and short form, with enhanced system and infrastructure. By combining data analysis and trend capturing capabilities, the business will establish a system of high-mix, low-volume sourcing to address diverse customer lifestyle and expand into new categories, thus enhancing our MD competitiveness.
[Foreign language]
Next is the results presentation. CJ ENM results are based on consolidated K-IFRS numbers, and internal transactions among different businesses have not been carved out. Now, our results for Q4 2025.
2020[Foreign language]
Next, I will talk about the results for the fourth quarter of 2025. Revenue reached KRW 1.427 trillion, a decrease compared to the previous year. But operating profit recorded KRW 86 billion, more than doubling on a YOY basis. I will go over the changes in [inaudible] of different business segments based on figures before consolidation adjustments. In the entertainment business, revenue decreased due to a high base effect from Fifth Season's major series, Severance Season 2 from the same period last year, but operating profit improved significantly, thanks to reduced losses in TVING, improved profitability of Fifth Season, strengthened distribution of drama content, and reduced losses from LiveCity.
Commerce revenue and profit grew due to high season effects, focusing on fall/winter fashion and the continuous expansion of mobile live commerce. From page six, I will discuss the performance of each business segment and our outlook for the second half of the year.
[Foreign language]
Despite a decline in TV advertisement revenue due to a continued slowdown in the advertising market, the media platform's revenue increased, aided by the inclusion of Wavve. In particular, TVING reduced its operating losses, thanks to a high growth in advertising revenue, driven by original hits such as EXchange and Dear X, as well as contributions from overseas branded zones. In 2026, subscribers will continue to increase through strengthened partnerships and bundles. The company plans to achieve performance growth through advertising revenue increase based on the integrated TVING Wavve ad operations, and by becoming a K-content hub centered on global branded zones. On the channel side, we will defend revenue and secure platform competitiveness by strengthening integrated TV OTT IP programming, and continuously enhance advertising products that link linear TV and digital.
[Foreign language]
Profitability for films and dramas has significantly improved, thanks to strong distribution sales of Fifth Season. Cost efficiency, as well as robust sales of E&M Studios dramas to Netflix and Amazon, and expanded sales of both new titles and libraries to new overseas sales partnerships, including HBO Max, Disney+, and others. Despite the high basis with the supply of major IP, Severance Season 2, in the same period last year. In 2026, we will continue simultaneous broadcasting with global OTT platforms, while expanding our global reference by discovering new partnerships centering around Japan, Southeast Asia, and North America. Additionally, we will increase profitability based on hit IPs, such as the musical Spirited Away, and strengthen our global presence by securing mega franchise IPs.
[Foreign language]
Despite the investment costs incurred for the growth of Mnet Plus, Music achieved the highest profit for the year, thanks to strong album sales from INI, JO1, and others. Record-breaking results from 2025 MAMA and pre-debut results from advertising and fan club subscriptions for AOV1. In 2026, we will focus on growing domestic and international sub-label revenues through artist expansion, while increasing Mnet Plus traffic centering around human IP and in-house content. Additionally, we will build proper synergies and strengthen business competitiveness by broadcasting global live performances, such as MAMA and KCON, through Mnet Plus, which will diversify our revenue sources.
[Foreign language]
Commerce saw significant profit improvement year-over-year, as MLC transaction volumes continued to grow, maximizing the benefits of peak season, driven by strong fashion sales in the fall-winter season, and the expansion of short-form and influencer commerce. Notably, the upgrade of the Baro delivery infrastructure and the strategic management of fandom portfolios like Labubu strengthened traffic and retention among the MZ generation, which is a remarkable achievement. In 2026, we plan to diversify customer lifestyle categories based on trend data analysis, and expand product planning links to live influencer commerce and reinforce differentiated IP formats, such as In-Channel Live, that only E&M can offer. Additionally, through the expansion of SNS OTT channels focused on short-form content, we aim to establish a growth structure for the commerce platform. For details, please refer to the presentation.
[Foreign language]
Now, we will deliver you the results presentation of Studio Dragon.
[Foreign language]
Hello, this is Hye-mi Lee, CFO of Studio Dragon. I will share our business performance for the year 2025 and the fourth quarter. 2025 was marked by a clear contrast between the first and second halves in terms of performance. Some titles in the first half showed lack of performance and viewership, leading to sluggish programming and sales. However, in the second half, key titles such as Bon Appétit, Your Majesty, Genie: Make a Wish, and Dear X achieve notable success both domestically and internationally, significantly improving our performance.
[Foreign language]
The total number of episodes aired in the second half stood at 130, an increase of 25 episodes compared to the same period last year, indicating a recovery in our lineup. Furthermore, the expansion of pre-sales and improvement in the hit ratio enhanced sales efficiency, resulting in a turnaround of results. With that, the company recorded an annual revenue of KRW 530.7 billion, and operating profit of KRW 30.4 billion. In the fourth quarter, increases in the number of aired episodes and pre-sales, as well as sales of older titles in the TV brand section, were reflected.
As a result, programming revenue grew by 33.9% YOY, and sales revenue by 4.9%, achieving sales of KRW 145.9 billion, operating profit of KRW 18.5 billion, with an operating margin of 12.7%. In 2026, we plan to normalize and line up with more than 25 titles through expansion of terrestrial and global OTT originals. We will also focus on production efficiency, including utilization of AI. Additionally, we will actively pursue new businesses such as commerce and digital, aiming to shift to an IP-centered structure. Thank you for your attention.
[Foreign language]
Now, we will be entertaining your questions. Given the time constraint, please limit your questions to three, centering on core issues. Foreign language. Now, Q&A session will begin. Please press asterisk one, asterisk and one, if you have any question. For cancellation, please press asterisk two, that is asterisk and two on your phone.
[Foreign language]
The first question will be given by Kim Hoe-jae from Daishin Securities. Please go ahead.
[Foreign language]
Yes, I have three questions. First is related to your advertisement revenue. Well, compared to the numbers that you have given us, well, I think that your, our ads performance is rather less. So what is your outlook for ad market recovery in year 2026, especially for the TV ads? And my second question is related to your overseas production hub. In your presentation that you mentioned that you will be expanding, your overseas production hub activity centering around the U.S. and Japan. So could you please give us a status update of what you're doing overseas, mainly in Japan? My third question is related to your non-operating expenses. The number seems quite high, so could you please give us a more detailed explanation on the non-operating expenses?
Yes, well, I'll give you my answer for our outlook in the TV ad market. Well, in 2026, we do expect to see a steady decrease when it comes to linear TV ad market, because the advertisers, their focus is more now on performance, so they will tend to move to the digital platform ad space, which is much more cost effective. But CJ ENM is in a different position to all other local players because we have a digital platform that is TVING and Wavve. So we will be providing the market with linear TV plus digital ad opportunities. That's what sets us aside. Yes, this is the answer provided by Studio Dragon when it comes to our US and Japan production hubs.
Well, we'll be working together with the U.S. and Japanese legal entities that belong to CJ ENM, and we will also be working together with the local partners there in our planning and production stages. So, Marry My Husband last year gave us great success in Japanese market, and we're building on our success. So we have a title that is on Netflix, which we'll plan to deliver in the first quarter. It's called The Soulmate. And as you're well aware, the production and production cycle in Japan is quite quick. With that, we hope to deliver you tangible results in year 2026. And as for our activities in the U.S. territory, we do have about 20 titles that is currently under development and planning.
But as you're well aware, in the U.S., we have to go through various stages and processes to deliver actually a title. And the best candidate that's close to a series order, we can number about three. We're continuously talking with these candidate titles.
[Foreign language]
So our net operating, non-operating loss is at KRW 133.3 billion . Much of it was related to our copyright loss and also the intangible asset losses with that belong to Studio Dragon, goodwill rights and also there were equity method losses amounting to KRW 50 billion , and intangible asset losses of KRW 47 billion , and financial losses amounting to KRW 58 billion . So on a year-on-year basis, there was a decrease of KRW 80 billion-KRW 48 billion . So on a month basis, there was a decrease by 25 billion KRW compared to the previous year.
Next question, please.
The following question is by Shin Eun-jung from DB Securities. Please go ahead.
Yes, I have three questions. First is on revenue for the fourth quarter, and if possible, could you give us a guidance for this year's revenue and operating profit for both TVING and Fifth Season? And my next question goes to commerce. I see that there has been significant profit improvement. Is it because of a change in your accounting practices, or was there actually a good reason behind your profit increase? And my third question is related to the business entering into branded zones of different OTTs. So, what was the profit recognition related to your branded zones in both?
I will give you the Q4 results for TVING first. Our revenue stood at, for TVING, KRW 118.8 billion, with an operating loss of KRW 4.1 billion. As for Fifth Season, Q4 revenue stood at KRW 184.7 billion, with an operating profit of KRW 10.6 billion.
TVING. TVING.
So this is an answer for your guidance request from TVING. So as was mentioned in our previous answers in the presentation, in the fourth quarter, we saw the lowest loss number ever at KRW 4.1 billion, and it was achieved in a quarter without the KBO season. And it's thanks to the subscriber base increase with and also the advertisement income increase. We also saw good results from international sales. So it's quite meaningful, in that we've laid the basic structure or the basic foundation that will give us income in the few years to come. So in year 2026, we saw this structural improvement, and with this structure now in place, we expect to see a further decrease of our loss numbers going forward.
Of course, we would have to invest some more going into the future to secure our top line growth in the future. So we would have to spend for some quarters, and with that, we conservatively expect some quarters to give us an even point and some quarters to record a better number.
Global team. Fifth Season.
So this is from Fifth Season. Well, we do have a line of three, four titles in 2026. We are waiting for some more green lights. So we are making this preparatory, working together with our platform partners and also with distribution channels and we will be working towards securing a good margin. So going forward, also in the year 2026, our focus will be on profitability and not just the top line numbers.
[Foreign language]
[Foreign language]
[Foreign language], commerce [Foreign language]
Y es, and if I may give you the results or the answers for comments. Well, there has been no accounting changes, so the accounting rules remain the same. The improved result was from our own efforts. Well, as was noted in the presentation, we had a very good operating result for Q4, focusing on our fashion offerings, the private brands. The sales performance was excellent with our fashion section and the beauty category and also the health functional foods. They are associated with better profitability, and these sectors performed well in the fourth quarter. And our brand subsidiaries, they also gave us good results, adding to our positive number. And we've continuously engaged in cost cutting measures, including adjustment of labor. So these activities together led to a better number for us in the Q4
[foreign language]
This is Ki once again, answering to your branded zone results question. Well, we cannot disclose the exact numbers, but I would say that the amount recognized was significant enough to cover much of our production cost. We do have a healthy number of titles that will be released into the market in 2026, namely about 10-20 titles. Going forward, we also expect to see much of a return from our branded zone activity.
Next question, please.
Currently, there are no participants with questions. Please press asterisk one, asterisk and one to give your question. The following question is by Hwa-jung Lee from NH Investment Securities. Please go ahead.
Yes, I have two questions. The first one goes to Kim, Jin-young. I see that the revenue itself from Q4 is smaller than what we have witnessed in Q3. But, having said that, your operating profit numbers are better. So was there a sort of a package deal that helped you boost up your profit numbers? This is my first question that goes to Kim, Jin-young. And my second one goes to Studio Dragon. I believe that you'll be releasing four more titles this year compared to year 2025. And, do the most of these new additions go to the Wednesday, Thursday slots?
[Foreign language]
Yes, as you've rightly mentioned, our operating profit numbers were better in fourth quarter. It's because we have more distribution-type revenue, which is associated with better profitability, and we also diversified our profit sources, including production, producing services and also equity method gains. In 2025, we have the seller results with Severance and Friendship, and that has given us an incentive amounting to $2 million. We've continuously worked on cost efficiency or cost optimization, too, all to boost the better profit number this time.
[Foreign language]
As for your lineup related question, that goes to Studio Dragon. Well, currently, for the Wednesday and Thursday slots, we have one title, Give Me the Universe. This is the only one. And you see an increase in the number of titles to be provided this year because of our extended work with the non-captives. We have plans for the terrestrial broadcasting companies, including MBC, KBS and SBS, and we also have plans with the originals for Netflix and Disney+. So based on this, in-house planning capabilities, we will be working on to enhance our titles and lineups.
Next, please.
Currently, there are no participants with question. Please press asterisk one, asterisk and one to give your question. Once again, if you have a question, please press asterisk one, asterisk and one. Currently, there are no participants with question. Please press asterisk one, asterisk and one to give your question.
Since there are no further questions, we will be ending our Q&A session here.
I once again thank the participants. That concludes Q&A and CJ ENM session. Thank you.
This concludes the Fiscal Year 2025 Fourth Quarter Earnings Results by CJ ENM. Thank you for your participation.