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Spotify paid the music industry $9 billion in 2023
Apparently, passing 602 million monthly active users was not the only big stat Spotify wanted to share this week. Two days after a solid report to investors that sent its stock up 8%, Spotify announced it had paid more than $9 billion to musicians and the music industry last year, its highest payout ever.
$9 million represents 63% of the $14.3B total revenue Spotify reported in 2023. That percentage has fallen from around 70% in earlier years as the streamer diversifies its content to include podcasts and audiobooks.
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The annual amount that Spotify pays the music industry has tripled in the last six years, totaling more than $48 billion since its founding.
The streamer said it will share more data in its annual Loud & Clear report in the coming weeks.
Underscoring Spotify’s importance to musicians and the industry, today’s $9B announcement comes at a moment when UMG is battling TikTok over payments and other streaming competitors are touting comparatively smaller numbers of their own.
MORE: Four big music takeaways from Spotify’s earnings call
Bruce Houghton is the Founder and Editor of Hypebot, a Senior Advisor at Bandsintown, President of the Skyline Artists Agency, and a Berklee College Of Music professor.