Asian Junkie Asian pop. Without discretion.
I have admittedly been procrastinating on updating about the situation with Lee Seung Gi and his company Hook Entertainment effectively defrauding him, but now he has spoken up himself in an Instagram post.
The star begins by explaining his emotional state at the moment, effectively saying that he’s been pissed, “Honestly, I have not been very well. Getting enraged from the betrayal, frustrated from the disappointment, feeling resentment one day and blaming myself the next, I have been spending my days repeating this.“
Lee Seung Gi then goes on to talk about the financial situation with Hook, saying that they deposited money into his account, but he explains that it’s not about the money but about the betrayal and his treatment.
This morning, I received a text message that about 5 billion won (approximately $3.8 million) was deposited into my bank account. It seems that Hook Entertainment probably thinks that I took legal action simply to receive money. I have never even received one of those typical statements of accounts for my music profits. They are trying to unilaterally wrap up this case under the pretext of paying the unpaid earnings. Until now, I lived without even knowing that there were music profits that I had to receive. I endured 18 years of being told that I am a “minus singer” (meaning negative profit margin). In this situation, the reason why I filed a lawsuit against Hook is not because of the unpaid earnings. Someone’s hard work and sweat should not be misused by someone else’s greed. I thought that fulfilling this mission is the best I can do. I have received 5 billion won now. Of course, I don’t know how this amount was calculated. However, I do not understand Hook’s calculation method, so I think I will continue to fight in court. It will become a tiresome fight, and I want to first apologize for causing fatigue to the public who is watching this occur.
To effectively drive home the point that it’s not about the money, he says he will be donating the unpaid earning he receives.
What I can promise, however, is that no matter the total amount of unpaid earnings, I will donate it all. Starting with the 5 billion won that was deposited today, excluding the legal aid costs, I will give back the rest to the community. This is not a decision I made in a day. The moment I decided on the fight against Hook, I decided to use all of the money I will receive to help those who are in need.
I have lived until now without knowing of my music profits. Of course, the 5 billion won I received today is such a big and valuable amount of money to me. It contains the sweat of my teens, 20s, and 30s. However, if this money can be used for those who are more in need than me, the happiness and value I feel will exceed that of just 5 billion won.
He also thanks fans and everybody for the support.
Yeah, he is absolutely dragging Hook right now and is having his Joker moment with this move, which somehow leaves Hook looking even worse than they already did.
It drives home the difference between the two sides: one is approaching this with a human element and values the relationship between people, the other sees relationships as transactional so they try to solve the dispute by throwing cash at the situation.
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In previous news, the money Lee Seung Gi is referring to is what Hook earlier said they paid to him in order to allegedly settle the debt they owed him for music.
Accordingly, we sent Lee Seung Gi the relevant data by the beginning of this week, and we tried to reach an amicable settlement with Lee Seung Gi based on that data.
However, the amount requested by Lee Seung Gi was too different from the amount he was owed, so we were unable to reach a mutual agreement.
In spite of this, Hook did not want a prolonged dispute over unpaid earnings with Lee Seung Gi, with whom we have maintained an exclusive contract for a long time. Therefore, aside from the base payment of 1.3 billion won [approximately $993,846], today, we paid Lee Seung Gi his unpaid earnings of 2.9 billion won [approximately $2.2 million], as well as 1.2 billion won [$917,298] worth of delayed interest, in full.
We have also confirmed that we owe no further debts to Lee Seung Gi, and in order to end our dispute over unpaid earnings with Lee Seung Gi, we have already filed a debt validation lawsuit with the court.
Amazingly they admit that they did not agree on a settlement, so Hook just tried to basically dump a sum of money in his lap and was hoping it would go away. Needless to say, it has not.
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In terms of Lee Seung Gi’s standing with the company, it was reported that he sent an official notice to Hook that he wanted to terminate his contract due to terms violation.
Additionally, Oscar-winning actress Youn Yuh Jung has also recently left the company.
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Meanwhile, the National Tax Service announced that they will be auditing Hook’s Kwon Jin Young in light of reports of her using company credit for her personal purchases. The NTS said they learned of all this in the media reports, “We learned through news outlets that Hook Entertainment’s Kwon CEO is alleged to have misused her company’s funds. We have begun an internal investigation into (the company’s) expense history and other financial records.“
A former manager has also stepped forward to confirm previous reports of Kwon Jin Young’s behavior and treatment of Lee Seung Gi, specifically testifying that the verbal abuse has been the same over decades.
After hearing Kwon Jin Young’s yelling in the recording, it was just like how it was 20 years ago. Back then, they would curse at each other, but now, even though the company’s size is different, I felt like this person hasn’t changed at all. And they would always try to bring Lee Seung Gi down. If he said something back, they would say, ‘Seung Gi, that’s why you aren’t going to make it.’ The phrase Kwon Jin Young said the most was, ‘Are you crazy?’
This is going about as horribly as one can imagine for Hook.
