The global ARMY is young now. Most are still in their teens and twenties. They buy albums, stream music, and collect merchandise.
But give them 15 years.
By 2040, those same fans will be in their thirties and forties. They will have jobs. They will have disposable income. And according to a new report from NH Investment & Securities, a South Korean securities firm, they will spend it on traveling to South Korea.
The economic impact of BTS and their global fandom is projected to add up to 0.35 percentage points to South Korea’s annual GDP by 2040. Tourism revenue from the fandom could reach between US13.4 billion per year.
For Bali — an island that has long relied on its own cultural magnetism to draw visitors — the report offers a warning wrapped inside an opportunity.
South Korea is not waiting for tourists to discover its beaches. It is building a tourism economy around a boy band.
Three Stages of Fandom Spending
Jung Yeo-kyung, a researcher at NH Investment & Securities, outlined how fan consumption evolves.
Stage one: streaming, albums, and merchandise.
Stage two: expansion into other Korean products — cosmetics, food, fashion.
Stage three: tourism. Fans begin traveling to South Korea, spending on hotels, restaurants, shopping, and transportation.
“Currently, 84 percent of the global ARMY is still in their teens and twenties, so their purchasing power is still relatively limited,” Jung said.
“But when they enter their thirties and forties and begin earning income, their consumption is likely to shift to tourism spending in Korea.”
The projection is based on data from the Hyundai Research Institute, which estimated that approximately 800,000 BTS fans visited South Korea in 2018. With an estimated 86.5 million BTS fans aged 10 to 29 in developing Asian and American countries, the report projects 4.3 million additional tourists per year by 2040.
What This Means for Bali
Bali and South Korea compete for the same international travelers — particularly from Southeast Asia, China, and the West. Both destinations offer beaches, culture, food, and Instagram-worthy landscapes.
But South Korea is now building a tourism pipeline that begins not with flight deals or hotel promotions, but with teenagers streaming music on their phones. By the time those teenagers are ready to travel, Korea will already be at the top of their destination list.
Bali, by contrast, has no equivalent strategy. The island’s tourism marketing remains general: beautiful beaches, warm weather, friendly people. There is no global pop phenomenon driving a generation of future travelers to book flights to Ngurah Rai Airport 15 years from now.
The BTS example is not replicable. No one can manufacture a fandom of that scale. But the principle is transferable: cultural consumption today becomes tourism spending tomorrow.
Fans who watch Korean dramas visit Korea. Fans who listen to K-pop visit Korea. Fans who eat Korean food, wear Korean fashion, and use Korean cosmetics are already preconditioned to choose Korea when they finally take their dream vacation.
What cultural exports are preconditioning future tourists to choose Bali?
The Warning
South Korea’s report assumes that 84 percent of BTS fans are currently too young and too poor to travel. That is not a weakness. That is a time delay.
By 2040, those fans will have money. And they will spend it on the country they have been emotionally connected to since adolescence.
Bali cannot compete with that level of long-term cultural conditioning unless it starts investing now in the cultural products — music, film, art, digital content — that will shape the preferences of the next generation of travelers.
The island has the raw materials: rich traditions, world-class artists, stunning visuals. What it lacks is a strategy to export those materials in forms that teenagers in Bangkok, Manila, and Kuala Lumpur will consume daily.
A teenager streaming BTS today is a tourist booking a flight to Seoul tomorrow.
A teenager watching Balinese dance on YouTube today could be a tourist booking a flight to Denpasar tomorrow — if the content exists, if the algorithms surface it, and if the cultural connection sticks.
South Korea is projected to gain 0.35 percentage points of GDP from a boy band.
Bali is still trying to recover pre-pandemic tourist numbers.
The difference is not luck. It is planning.
BTS fans will grow up. They will travel. They will spend. And South Korea will be ready for them.
Bali can either watch from across the sea — or start building its own pipeline.
