Universal & Warner Music Shares Show Modest Gains Amid Stock Market Slide

The two largest publicly traded record label and music publishing companies posted stock gains in a week that otherwise saw major indexes fall sharply.

Shares of both Universal Music Group (UMG) and Warner Music Group (WMG) managed modest gains this week as companies prepare to release their latest quarterly earnings reports. UMG, which reports earnings on Wednesday (July 24), rose 2.6% to 28.11 euros ($30.61). Year-to-date, UMG shares are up 8.9%. 

WMG, which reports earnings on Aug. 8, gained 3.5% to $32.00 after receiving a nod from Jefferies analysts earlier in the week. Noting that WMG shares are down this year (-10.6% as of Friday) and trade at a discount to UMG, Jefferies called WMG’s current price “attractive” and believes the company will benefit from its slate of new releases (Zach Bryan, Dua Lipa) and cost-saving measures. Indeed, WMG did well in the first half of the year by owning the top three tracks in the U.S., according to Luminate’s midyear report. Jefferies has a $38 price target on WMG, which represents an 18.8% upside over Friday’s closing price. 

The Billboard Global Music Index fell 2.9% to 1,779.41, dropping its year-to-date gain to 16.0%. Overall, nine stocks were gainers, ten were losers and one was unchanged. But the rough week extended far beyond music stocks. The Nasdaq composite fell 3.6% to 17,726.94 as investors dumped tech stocks such as chipmaker Nvidia (down 8.8% this week) and cybersecurity company Crowdstrike (down 11.1% on Friday thanks to a massive global internet outage), while the S&P 500 fell 2.0% to 5,505.00. In the United Kingdom, the FTSE 100 dropped 1.2% to 8,155.72. South Korea’s KOSPI composite index fell 2.2% to 2,795.46. China’s Shanghai Composite Index rose 0.4% to 2,982.31. 

Spotify shares fell for the second consecutive week, dropping 2.4% to $295.09. On Thursday (July 18), Guggenheim reiterated its “buy” rating and $400 price target. Analysts expect to see some “modest cost savings” from lower publishing royalties, a move that has sparked controversy in the music industry and attracted the attention of some U.S. lawmakers. What’s more, Guggenheim analysts do not expect a “significant portion” of premium subscribers to switch to the lower-cost “basic” tier following price increases for the standard plans. Investors weren’t as optimistic, though, and Spotify fell 10.8% below its 2024 high of $331.08 set on June 5.

SiriusXM fell 8.1% to $3.41, bringing its year-to-date loss to 37.7%. This week, Morgan Stanley slightly lowered its forecast for net satellite radio subscriber additions in both the second quarter and the full year. SiriusXM, which reports quarterly earnings on Aug. 1, lost 1.4% of its satellite radio subscribers in the first quarter of 2024. 

LiveOne shares rose 5.7% to $1.49 following the release of a preliminary look at quarterly earnings on Thursday. The music streaming company, which owns Slacker and a majority of podcaster PodcastOne, expects fiscal first-quarter revenue to increase 20% to $33.1 million. 

K-pop stocks added to their losing streaks this week. HYBE fell 3.8% to 182,500 won ($131.31) and brought its year-to-date loss to 21.8%. SM Entertainment fell 5.8% to 73,300 won ($52.74) and has dropped 20.4% this year despite launching a new joint venture with Kakao Entertainment and overhauling its corporate governance. YG Entertainment lost 8% to 35,250 won ($25.36), bringing its year-to-date decline to 30.7%. JYP Entertainment was an outlier, gaining 2.6% this week to 59,000 won ($42.45), although the stock is still down 41.8% this year.

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