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Spotify doesn't make profit from music streaming, despite having over 400M monthly active users, because it pays two-thirds of all its revenue to the rights holders. (open.substack.com)

submitted 11 months ago by 4realz@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

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[–] Lutra@lemmy.world 27 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Equity.

In total, at the close of last year, SEC documents show that exactly 65 percent of Spotify was owned by just six parties: the firm’s co- founders, Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon (30.6 percent of ordinary shares between them); Tencent Holdings Ltd. (9.1 percent); and a run of three asset-management specialists: Baillie Gifford (11.8 percent), Morgan Stanley (7.3 percent), and T.Rowe Price Associates (6.2 percent). These three investment powerhouses owned more than 25 percent of Spotify between them — a fact worth remembering next time there’s an argument about whose interests Spotify is acting in when it makes controversial moves (for example, SPOT’s ongoing legal appeal against a royalty pay rise for songwriters in the United States).

Furthermore, according to MBW estimates, which my sources suggest are still solid, two major record companies — Sony Music Entertainment and Universal Music Group — continue to jointly own between six percent and seven percent of Spotify (Sony around 2.35 percent and Universal around 3.5). With Sony and UMG added into the mix, then, the names mentioned here comfortably own more than 70 percent of Spotify.


https://www.rollingstone.com/pro/news/who-really-owns-spotify-955388/>