This article was displayed on the ChosunBiz MoneyMove (MM) site at 2:52 p.m. on Jun. 23, 2026.
As the merger of the online video service (OTT) Tving and Wavve has drifted for more than two years due to KT's refusal to consent, SLL JoongAng, which is in financial crisis, has ultimately been forced to directly sell its Tving equity. The market had expected that SLL JoongAng would likely exercise appraisal rights during the merger process to recover its investment. But as the merger dragged on, exercising the claim became virtually impossible, and in the meantime the liquidity crisis at JoongAng Group surfaced, leaving SLL JoongAng with no capacity to wait any longer.
Some in the market had floated the possibility that CJ ENM, Tving's largest shareholder, would buy SLL JoongAng's equity stake. However, with projections that expenses in the 100 billion won range could arise due to penalty surcharges and compensation tied to Tving's recent massive data leak incident, analysis suggests it is unlikely that CJ Group would step in first to acquire SLL JoongAng's equity.
According to the investment banking (IB) industry on the 23rd, SLL JoongAng is reviewing the sale of its Tving shares and convertible bonds (CB). As of the end of last year, SLL JoongAng held 12.74% of Tving common stock. The book value of the CB is about 252.4 billion won, and if converted into shares, SLL JoongAng's combined Tving equity ratio is estimated to exceed 20%.
Tving and Wavve signed a merger memorandum of understanding (MOU) in Dec. 2023. Although the Korea Fair Trade Commission conditionally approved the business combination in Jun. last year, clearing the regulatory hurdle, the merger stalled after KT Studio Genie, which holds 13.54% of Tving equity, did not consent. Because the deal structure requires unanimous consent of major shareholders, without a decision from KT it is difficult to proceed with the main contract and follow-up procedures for the two companies' merger.
Appraisal rights can also be exercised only after the board resolution and shareholders' meeting approval procedures related to the merger take place. Because the transaction stopped at the prior stage due to KT's opposition, SLL JoongAng has been unable to even realize the option of selling its shares back to the company in opposition to the merger. As a result, the industry views finding a buyer directly over the counter as the only exit (investment recovery) method.
The problem is that there are hardly any suitable buyers willing to take SLL JoongAng's Tving equity. The industry believes the likelihood that CJ ENM, Tving's largest shareholder, will purchase SLL JoongAng's secondary shares is very low. That is because the leak of personal data of 19.53 million Tving members is expected to require funds in the 100 billion won range.
While the prevailing outlook is that the statutory penalty surcharge will be capped at the 12 billion won range, even compensating each victim only 5,000 won would add 100 billion won in expense. The industry also expects additional expenditures will be unavoidable to deal with the incident, including security investment, legal expenses, class-action costs, and refunds for passes.
Although Tving is the direct party liable for the penalty surcharge, because Tving's own cash capacity is insufficient, there is a possibility that CJ ENM, the largest shareholder, will need to support funding through a capital increase or lending. As of the end of last year, Tving's current assets (assets that can be cashed within one year) were 123.7 billion won, far short of current liabilities of 271.8 billion won. Given this, from CJ ENM's perspective, it is more urgent to inject limited funds directly into Tving rather than buy secondary shares.
It is also expected to be difficult to find a third-party investor to acquire Tving equity. What SLL JoongAng holds is a minority stake without management control, and Tving is still in the red. Last year's operating loss was close to 70 billion won.
On top of that, due to KT's opposition, it is hard to predict the timing for closing the merger with Wavve, and because neither the future expenses arising from the data leak nor the scale of subscriber churn has been determined, it is difficult to assess corporate value.
An IB industry official said, "Rather than selling common shares and CBs in a bundle, SLL JoongAng could first sell at a discount the CBs, which are relatively more recoverable, or pursue in parallel a plan to raise funds by using Tving equity as collateral."