Music as an Investment – Part 1: An Overview

Until a few years ago, music publishing was considered to be a rather boring business field in which music rights are acquired and licensed for various uses. This business model has not principally changed, but music rights have become a speculative investment in recent years, when new players such as Hipgnosis, Primary Wave and Round Hill entered the market with spectacular music catalogue acquisitions in the multi-digit million range.

This blog entry traces the development of the music rights market and the most important players in recent years and is the introduction to a multi-part blog series on “Music as an Investment”.

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The Economics of Music – 2nd Edition

In July 2021, the fully updated 2nd edition of “The Economics of Music” has been published by Agenda Publishing, which was reviewed by the eminent cultural economist David Throsby in the TIMES Literary Supplement: https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/the-music-business/

 

Promotional text:

The music industry is one of the most dynamic business sectors. It has had to evolve and adapt to continually changing technologies and business models. Its latest challenge has been Covid-19 and the loss of live music at a time when live performance outstrips music sales as the primary source of income for today’s artists. The second edition of this much used introduction to the economic workings of the music business explores the impact of the pandemic at every level of the sector and considers how the business model may need to change going forward as different stakeholder positions shift. The new edition also examines new trends in the music industry such as the increasing dominance of tech companies and data, the increasing importance of CMOs as market players, the increased role of artist management, which has impacted on new business contracts, as well as changes to how we use music in our everyday lives and how this impacts on new entrepreneurial behaviours around music.

The Economics of Music SECOND EDITION

Peter Tschmuck

Hardback  €79,71 | £60.00  |  $90.00   ISBN 9781788214261

Paperback €26.57 | £18.99  |  $30.00   ISBN 9781788214278

e-book      €18,38 | £18.99  |  $30.00   ISBN 9781788214292

 

264 pages   |  210 x 148mm   |  08 July 2021

 

Series: Economics of Big Business

 

Book order: https://www.agendapub.com/books/165/the-economics-of-music-second-edition

Music Majors in the Streaming Economy: Warner Music Group

In its last annual report Warner Music Group (WMG) exhibited a total revenue of US $3.58bn – the highest since the recorded music company was sold by Time-Warner to the Investor Group in 2003. Although overall costs also increased to US $3.15bn (WMG 2017: 38-39), the operating income is remarkably high with US $222m (WMG 2017: 40) especially compared to the disastrous results of the early 2000 years with annual losses of about 1 billion US$. The main driver of the revenue growth is the music streaming boom. In the recorded music segment streaming revenue increased by US $434m to US 1.34bn in the fiscal year ending on September 30, 2017. The music publishing segment contributed a further increase of US $58m of streaming revenue (WMG 2017: 36). Thus, WMG earned almost US $500m more with music streaming in 2017 compared to 2016. The further analysis highlights how the music major’s business model has shifted to the music streaming economy.

Warner Music Group in the Digital Paradigm Shift

On December 8, Warner Music Group (WMG) released the annual report for the financial year 2016 ending on September 30, 2016 reporting the highest revenue of US$ 3.25bn since Access Industries has acquired WMG in 2011. WMG also reported its best profit performance – measured in operating income before depreciation and amortization (OIBDA) – of US$ 507m since 2006. For the first time after Access Industries’ takeover, WMG will pay a dividend of US$ 54m to its shareholders (WMG 2016: 110). Those key facts indicate a healthy business performance of the smallest music recording major company in the digitalised music industry. Thus, the following analysis highlights the causes for WMG’s economic recovery and the re-structuring of its business model.

The Global Music Publishing Market – An Analysis

In a Music Business World Wide article[1], music industry analyst Will Page calculated a value of US $11.34bn for the global music publishing market in 2014. The number comprises of US $7.55bn for the collection of performance fees, US $1.32bn for mechanical collections and US $0.35bn for private copying collections by CISAC[2] members and US $0.42bn for non-CISAC mechanical collections (e.g. Harry Fox Agency collections). Further US $1.70bn of revenue have to be added for music directly licensed by the publishers (“grand rights” and synchronisation rights).

 

Figure 1: The global value of the music publishing market in 2014

Source: After Music Business World Wide, “$25 billion: The best number to happen to the global music business in a very long time”, December 10, 2015 (retrieved January 19, 2016)

 

The analysis highlights that music publishing is as relevant as the recorded music industry with a global market volume of about US$ 15bn. Therefore, this blog post analysis the global music publishing market in a long-term perspective and investigates economic relevance of music publishing for the music majors – Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group – as well as the structure of the global music publishing market.