Universal Music Group Files for U.S. Public Offering

New York Times

4 days ago

Universal Music Group — the music titan behind popular artists like Taylor Swift and Drake — said on Monday that it had submitted a proposal for a public offering in the United States.
The company, which is based in the Netherlands, filed a confidential draft registration statement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, it said in a statement on Monday. It's not clear yet how many shares it will offer, or for how much.
The offering is part of a deal Universal reached in January with Pershing Square, as described by Bill Ackman, the hedge fund's founder and chief executive in January on social media. That agreement said Pershing could ask Universal Music to list in the United States if the hedge fund sells at least $500 million of its stock in the offering. . Pershing Square's total investment in Universal Music Group was $3.3 billion, Mr. Ackman said.
Sales of recorded music drove revenue growth for Universal Music last year, which saw the release of new albums by artists like Ms. Swift, Billie Eilish and Sabrina Carpenter, who rank among the most streamed artists globally on Spotify and Apple Music. Universal owns the labels that publish and distribute music from those and other artists.
The group's heft was on display last year when Universal pulled songs owned or published by its labels from TikTok over a dispute for royalties from music used on the short-form video app. The two companies settled that dispute in May 2024.
Universal will not receive any proceeds from the sale of ordinary shares by the selling shareholders, it said.