BLACKPINK member Rosé has officially withdrawn from the Korea Music Copyright Association (KOMCA), making a big move in her global career.

On February 20, KOMCA revealed that Rosé had submitted a request to terminate her trust agreement on October 31 last year. After a three-month grace period, her contract officially ended on January 31.

This makes Rosé the second Korean singer ever to leave KOMCA, following Seo Taiji, who became the first artist to withdraw on April 4, 2003. She is also the first female singer to make this decision.

According to reports, Rosé’s departure from KOMCA was due to double commission fees. Last September, she signed an exclusive contract with Atlantic Records, a label under Warner Music Group, marking the start of her full-scale U.S. activities.

Since her focus is now on international promotions, managing separate copyrights in Korea and the U.S. was no longer necessary. Moving forward, all of Rosé’s copyrights will be handled by a U.S. publisher.

Source: [1]

Sunmi is caught up in controversy after the NFT project she promoted made billions of KRW—only to lose most of its value, leaving investors frustrated.

According to Kyunghyang Shinmun on February 21, Sunmi, her agency, and a KOSDAQ-listed company launched the NFT collection Sunmiya Club in February 2022.

The project used blockchain technology to verify ownership of digital assets, turning illustrations inspired by Sunmi’s career into NFTs. Buyers were promised exclusive services to increase their investment value.

Thanks to Sunmi’s strong promotion, the NFTs were a huge success at first, selling out and making billions of KRW.

However, things took a turn when the NFT market crashed due to the Terra-Luna crisis and the bankruptcy of the U.S. crypto exchange FTX in late 2022.

By 2023, Sunmiya Club had stalled, and the once high-value NFTs dropped to just tens of thousands of KRW.

As investors faced major losses, some turned their frustration toward Sunmi. In response, the company behind the project stated, “We have fully followed the roadmap announced at the beginning and have continued operations.

The funds raised from the NFTs were used for operational costs and investments in a new platform launched last year.”

Despite the company’s defense, many are still questioning what went wrong and whether Sunmi will address the backlash.

Source: [1]