SPOT - Spotify Technology S.A.
| Previous close | 127.61 |
| Open | 127.54 |
| Bid | 127.58 x 900 |
| Ask | 127.94 x 1200 |
| Day's range | 124.88 - 129.81 |
| 52-week range | 109.18 - 161.38 |
| Volume | 399,605 |
| Avg. volume | 1,595,896 |
| Market cap | 23.732B |
| Beta (5Y monthly) | 1.41 |
| PE ratio (TTM) | N/A |
| EPS (TTM) | -7.63 |
| Earnings date | 28 Apr 2020 |
| Forward dividend & yield | N/A (N/A) |
| Ex-dividend date | N/A |
| 1y target est | 152.77 |
- Zacks
Apple's (AAPL) $50M Fund to Support Amateur Indie Musicians
Apple's (AAPL) latest effort to fight the coronavirus pandemic includes its offer of a $50-million advanced royalty fund for independent record labels.
- Business Wire
Spotify Technology S.A. to Announce Financial Results for First Quarter 2020
Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE: SPOT) will post its first quarter 2020 financial results and letter to shareholders on Wednesday, April 29, 2020 before market open.
- Bloomberg
Apple's New Deal With Amazon Prime Video Is a Game Changer
(Bloomberg Opinion) -- What was once sacrosanct is no more. Apple Inc. seems to have blinked.Late Wednesday, Bloomberg News reported that Apple has relaxed its rules requiring a 30% cut for any content sold inside video apps on its iOS platform. The tech giant said its program allows “premium subscription video” providers the ability to charge consumers directly using their own payment systems without paying a commission to Apple.For customers of Amazon.com Inc., which started taking advantage of the change on Wednesday, it means Amazon’s Prime Video subscribers in the U.S., U.K. and Germany, can now buy or rent video content using the e-commerce company’s app on Apple’s platforms. Amazon.com Inc. had previously only allowed video purchases outside of Apple’s ecosystem, such as its website. Canal+, owned by Vivendi SA, and Altice USA Inc.’s Altice One had already joined Apple’s program in recent years.As recently as last year, Apple CEO Tim Cook told CBS News the company didn’t have a dominant position in any market. But analysts have said Apple’s App Store may be the one business where it actually had excessive power over developers, because of the steep commission it was able to demand in exchange for allowing their apps, in-app purchases and subscriptions to be sold on its platforms. (The 30% subscription fee is lowered to 15% after the first year.)The Apple App Store’s high commission structure has been infuriating for many companies. In 2019, music-streaming company Spotify Technology SA filed a complaint against Apple with the European Commission, while Epic Games Inc. CEO Tim Sweeney, whose company makes Fortnite, has consistently railed against Apple’s commission structure as unjustified. Netflix Inc. even abandoned using Apple’s payment system altogether to avoid the fee in 2018.Why did Apple budge? Perhaps it’s a move to preempt further pressure from regulators. Whatever the reason, once the first step is made toward lower fees, there is no turning back.It’s only a matter time before other companies such as Netflix, Spotify and countless others ask for better terms as well. Lower middle-man fees can also be good news for consumers if it leads to lower prices, too.This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners.Tae Kim is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering technology. He previously covered technology for Barron's, following an earlier career as an equity analyst.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinionSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Reuters
Apple will stop taking cut of some Amazon video purchases on App Store
To make purchases inside apps on its App Store, Apple requires the use of Apple's own payment systems and takes a commission of between 15% and 30% before passing on the rest to the third-party app developer. Many of Apple's rivals in streaming music and video, such as Netflix Inc and Spotify Technology SA , avoid paying those commissions by asking users to sign up with a credit card outside the App Store. Spotify said Apple's practices hurt its business by making it harder for iPhone users to sign up for Spotify instead of Apple Music and filed an antitrust complaint last year in the European Union.
- Bloomberg
Apple Lets Some Video Apps Sell Shows Without Taking 30% Cut
(Bloomberg) -- Apple Inc. has relaxed a controversial policy that took a 30% cut of payments when video apps on its platform sold TV shows and movies.Amazon.com Inc. started taking advantage of the change on Wednesday, selling and renting movies via its Prime Video service on Apple devices without needing to give Apple a share of the money.“Apple has an established program for premium subscription video entertainment providers to offer a variety of customer benefits,” the Cupertino, California-based technology giant said in a emailed statement. The program applies to multiple services, including Amazon Prime Video. Canal+, a unit of Vivendi SA, started participating in 2018. Altice One, a cloud-based video service from Altice USA Inc., signed up in February.The program lets these premium services charge viewers via their own payment method instead of Apple’s in-app-purchase system, which takes a 30% cut. “Customers have the option to buy or rent movies and TV shows using the payment method tied to their existing video subscription,” Apple said in the statement.Apple said the program also provides a number of other benefits, including “integration with the Apple TV app, AirPlay 2 support, tvOS apps, universal search, Siri support and, where applicable, single or zero sign-on.”Most other types of apps and services on Apple devices like the iPhone, iPad, and Apple TV require the use of Apple’s in-app-purchase system for downloads and upgrades. Some developers, including Spotify Technology SA, have said Apple’s system is an antitrust issue and have had to raise their prices by 30% for iPhone users to offset Apple’s fees.Read more: Apple and Google Face Growing Revolt Over App Store ‘Tax’ (Updates with details of program participants in fourth paragraph.)For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- TechCrunch
Spotify and Warner Music Group renew their global licensing deal, resolve issue in India
Spotify and Warner Music Group have renewed their global licensing partnership, the two said on Wednesday, confirming that the giant music label's songs will now be available on the Sweden-headquartered firm's platform in India. This expanded deal covers countries where Spotify is available today, as well as additional markets. The move comes months after Spotify signed a licensing agreement with Warner Music Group's music publish arm Warner Chappell in India to put an end to their months-long legal battle.
- Yahoo Finance
How companies are stepping up to ease coronavirus hardships
As companies around the country and world suffer from the effects of the deadly novel coronavirus, some businesses are stepping up to help alleviate some of the economic impact. Here’s a list of some of their efforts so far. We’ll continue to update this list as more companies contribute to the relief effort.
- TechCrunch
Spotify adds fundraising features and a COVID-19 news hub to address the health crisis
Spotify this morning announced a series of new initiatives to address the COVID-19 health crisis across its platform. The company is launching a financial relief effort for those in the creative community who have been heavily impacted by the virus, which includes the addition of a public donations feature on its website. The company is also working to add a new feature that will allow artists to fundraise directly from their fans via their Spotify artist profile pages.
- Reuters
Spotify launches music relief project to help artists
The music streaming platform, which had about 124 million paid subscribers, also partnered with non-profit organizations such as MusiCares and Help Musicians, a UK-based charity for musicians, it said in a statement. Spotify said apart from donating funds to those charities, it would match donations made through the music relief page for up to $10 million.
- Zacks
The Zacks Analyst Blog Highlights: Spotify, Amazon, Apple and Alphabet
The Zacks Analyst Blog Highlights: Spotify, Amazon, Apple and Alphabet
- TechCrunch
Resso, ByteDance's music streaming app, officially launches in India, sans Tencent-backed Universal Music
TikTok, the hugely popular social media app, found a lot of early traction by giving users a way to create funny lip-synced versions of clips from well-known songs and then share them with friends (its predecessor in the West was even called Musically). Now at long last, TikTok's owner, China's ByteDance, is doubling down on the music connection with the release of its first standalone full music streaming app, starting first in India. Today, the company is launching Resso, which describes itself as a "social music streaming app": users are encouraged to share lyrics, comments and other user-generated content with each other, alongside full-length tracks of music that they can consume and also share with others.
- Zacks
Music Streaming Stocks to Benefit From Virus-Led Lockdown
Here we pick four music streaming stocks that are expected to benefit from increased usage due to growing speculations of coronavirus-led lockdowns in various parts of the world.
- Business Wire
Spotify Chief Financial Officer to Present at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media & Telecom Conference
Spotify Technology S.A. (NYSE: SPOT) announced today that Paul Vogel, Chief Financial Officer, will present at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecom Conference in San Francisco on Wednesday, March 4, 2020. Mr. Vogel is scheduled to appear at 8:45 a.m. Pacific Time.
- Yahoo Finance
Social Chain's Steven Bartlett: Here's what makes podcasting so 'sticky and addictive'
Social Chain CEO Steven Bartlett joins The Final Round to discuss the evolution of the podcasting, and what's next for this booming industry.
- Yahoo Finance
Coronavirus-induced stock selloff means IPO market is 'on holiday': veteran IPO analyst
DoorDash filed confidential paperwork to go public. According to a veteran analyst, neither it nor many of its competitors will be able to IPO anytime soon in this turbulent market.
- Bloomberg
Lakestar’s New $735 Million Fund Adds to European VC Boom
(Bloomberg) -- Lakestar has raised $735 million for its European investment funds, part of a wave of capital that’s fueling the continent’s venture capital scene.The money will be split between two funds with a third going to early stage companies and the rest to more mature “growth” companies, the firm said in a statement on Tuesday.This year has already seen Atomico, the London-based tech investment firm, raise $820 million for its fifth fund targeting European startups. Other significant new funds include Balderton Capital and Northzone, who raised a combined $900 million late last year.“Finally venture capital has become a profitable asset class of its own in Europe,” Lakestar founder Klaus Hommels said in an interview.The firm started raising the fund in 2018, people familiar with the discussions said at the time, the year that Stockholm-based Spotify Technology SA achieved a valuation above $25 billion with its direct listing on the New York Stock Exchange and Adyen NV raised about 947 million euros ($1 billion) in its June debut in Amsterdam.Hommels, an early backer of Spotify Technology SA, Facebook Inc. and Skype, founded Lakestar in 2013. The company now has offices in Switzerland and London, and recent investments include hotel data startup Impala and German-based Scoutbee and Sennder -- companies focused on supply chain and logistics.The money, which will be used to invest in early stage and growth companies, will be split among two funds. One third of the capital will be used to invest in early stage investments while the rest will be allocated to a fund investing in growth companies.Speedinvest GmbH, the Austrian venture capital firm, on Tuesday also announced that it has raised 190 million euros for its third fund, and is planning to invest in fintechs and in startups focusing on the industrial and health sectors.\--With assistance from Matthias Wabl.To contact the reporter on this story: Sarah Syed in London at ssyed35@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Giles Turner at gturner35@bloomberg.net, Amy ThomsonFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Bloomberg
Apple Weighs Letting Users Switch Default iPhone Apps to Rivals
(Bloomberg) -- Apple Inc. is considering giving rival apps more prominence on iPhones and iPads and opening its HomePod speaker to third-party music services after criticism the company provides an unfair advantage to its in-house products.The technology giant is discussing whether to let users choose third-party web browser and mail applications as their default options on Apple’s mobile devices, replacing the company’s Safari browser and Mail app, according to people familiar with the matter. Since launching the App Store in 2008, Apple hasn’t allowed users to replace pre-installed apps such as these with third-party services. That has made it difficult for some developers to compete, and has raised concerns from lawmakers probing potential antitrust violations in the technology industry.The web browser and mail are two of the most-used apps on the iPhone and iPad. To date, rival browsers like Google Chrome and Firefox and mail apps like Gmail and Microsoft Outlook have lacked the status of Apple’s products. For instance, if a user clicks a web link sent to them on an iPhone, it will automatically open in Safari. Similarly, if a user taps an email address -- say, from a text message or a website -- they’ll be sent to the Apple Mail app with no option to switch to another email program.The Cupertino, California-based company also is considering loosening restrictions on third-party music apps, including its top streaming rival Spotify Technology SA, on HomePods, said the people, who asked not to be named discussing internal company deliberations.Read more: Apple’s Default iPhone Apps Give It Growing Edge Over App Store RivalsApple’s closed system to prohibit users from setting third-party apps as defaults was questioned last year during a hearing of a U.S. House of Representatives antitrust panel. Lawmakers pressed the issue of whether iPhone users can make non-Apple apps their defaults in categories including web browsers, maps, email and music.Being a default app on the world’s best-selling smartphone is valuable because consumers are subtly coaxed and prodded into using this more-established software rather than alternatives. Keeping users tethered to Apple’s services is important to the company as the growth of smartphone demand slows and sales of music, video, cloud storage and other subscriptions make up a greater share of the iPhone maker’s total revenue.An Apple spokesman declined to comment.The company currently pre-installs 38 default apps on iPhones and iPads, Bloomberg News has reported, including the Safari web browser, Maps, Messages and Mail.Last year, Stockholm-based Spotify submitted an antitrust complaint to the European Union, saying Apple squeezes rival services by imposing a 30% cut for subscriptions made via the App Store. Apple responded that Spotify wants the benefits of the App Store without paying for them. As part of its complaint, Spotify singled out the inability to run on the HomePod and become the default music player in Siri, Apple’s voice-activated digital assistant.Now, Apple is working to allow third-party music services to run directly on the HomePod, said the people. Spotify and other third-party music apps can stream from an iPhone or iPad to the HomePod via Apple’s AirPlay technology. That’s a much more cumbersome experience than streaming directly from the speaker.Opening the HomePod to additional music service may be a boon for the product. The speaker has lagged behind rivals like the Amazon Echo in functionality since being introduced in 2018 and owns less than 5% of the smart-speaker market, according to an estimate last week from Strategy Analytics.Also under discussion at Apple is whether to let users set competing music services as the default with Siri on iPhones and iPads, the people said. Currently, Apple Music is the default music app. If the company changes the arrangement, a user would be able to play music from Spotify or Pandora automatically when asking Siri for a song.The potential changes to third-party apps on Apple’s devices and the HomePod are still under discussion or early development, and final decisions haven’t been made, the people said. If Apple chooses to go forward with the moves, they could appear as soon as later this year via the upcoming iOS 14 software update and a corresponding HomePod software update, the people said.Apple typically announces major new iPhone and iPad software versions in June, and releases them in September around the launch of new iPhone models. For this year’s update, Apple is also planning to focus on performance and quality because the current version, iOS 13, has been riddled with bugs that upset some users.To contact the reporter on this story: Mark Gurman in Los Angeles at mgurman1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Tom Giles at tgiles5@bloomberg.net, Andrew Pollack, Robin AjelloFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- TechCrunch
How Spotify ran the largest Google Dataflow job ever for Wrapped 2019
In early December, Spotify launched its annual personalized Wrapped playlist with its users' most-streamed sounds of 2019. Because this was quite a large job, Spotify gave us a bit of a look under the covers of how it generated these lists for its ever-growing number of free and paid subscribers. It's no secret that Spotify is a big Google Cloud Platform user.
- TechCrunch
Spotify mimics Apple's design with new podcast show page updates
Spotify's ongoing investments in the podcast-streaming side of its business helped boost podcast listening on its service by 200% last year. In particular, Spotify has given podcast show trailers a more prominent position in its app. Show trailers help podcasts find new listeners by offering a concise introduction to the podcast and its creators.
- Bloomberg
Palantir Revises Compensation to Save Cash, Prep for Future IPO
(Bloomberg) -- Palantir Technologies Inc., a data mining company co-founded by Peter Thiel, is changing its employee compensation in a bid to cut costs, ensure all employees can own shares and prepare for an eventual public stock listing, said three people familiar with the matter.The company, which helps governments and businesses collect and analyze data, will move toward eliminating cash bonuses and instead reward staff with restricted stock units, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing internal matters. The change was conveyed to staff in an email Friday.“Palantir has entered a new stage where we need to not only continue focusing on growth but also to ensure that growth is long-term sustainable as we march toward a successful IPO,” Khan Tasinga, a Palantir executive, wrote in the email to employees reported earlier by Business Insider. A spokeswoman for Palantir declined to comment.The email didn’t offer a timeline for an initial public offering. Thiel, Palantir’s chairman, told staff in September that the company wouldn’t go public in the next two to three years. Alex Karp, the chief executive officer, has told employees more recently that going public remains a goal that each department is working toward, without offering a target date, people familiar with the matter said.One of the paths to the public markets Palantir is considering has not been previously reported: a direct listing, said one of the people. The process, which makes a company’s shares available to trade on a stock exchange without raising money for the business, is rare but gaining attention after the listings of Spotify Technology SA and Slack Technologies Inc. This year, Airbnb Inc. is expected to directly list its stock, which would make it the most valuable company to do so.Palantir is known as much for its multimillion-dollar contracts with the Defense Department as for Thiel, its controversial backer. The billionaire started the Palo Alto, California, company with Karp in 2004.The company has long offered employee bonuses in the form of stock options, which can be expensive to acquire and carry significant tax liabilities. About a year ago, Palantir cut the price of options and increased cash bonuses in moves designed to bolster morale and address the company’s declining share price seen in private transactions.The move away from cash bonuses and the lack of a clear plan for going public could rankle many employees. But some staff have been lobbying management for the change to restricted stock units and applauded the shift because it gives them a stake in the company’s success, the people familiar with the matter said. All bonuses will be paid entirely in stock units by next year, the people said.To contact the reporter on this story: Lizette Chapman in San Francisco at lchapman19@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Mark Milian at mmilian@bloomberg.net, Anne VanderMeyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
- Yahoo Finance
SoundCloud: We're a 'social music experience,' not just a '$10 product'
With its new $75 million investment from Sirius XM, SoundCloud says it's focused on being more of a "social music experience" than competing directly with the likes of Apple Music.
- TechCrunch
Spotify is giving songwriters their own pages and playlists
Spotify is launching a new feature called songwriter pages, which allows songwriters to showcase a list of the songs they've written, alongside their most frequent artist collaborations. The pages will also include a new "Written By" playlist of the songwriter's songs, allowing listeners to stream their songs, follow their new material, and surface the songwriters' work through Spotify's search engine. At launch, Spotify is debuting songwriter pages for top artists, including Meghan Trainor, Fraser T. Smith, Missy Elliott, Teddy Geiger, Ben Billions and Justin Tranter, among others.
- Zacks
Apple (AAPL) Music Hires Jeff Bronikowski Amid Streaming War
Apple (AAPL) hires Warner Music Group executive Jeff Bronikowski for Apple Music amid growing music streaming war.
- Bloomberg
Samsung’s Answer to IPhone Is a Galaxy of Partnerships
(Bloomberg) -- On a day when Samsung Electronics Co. announced four new high-spec smartphones, the company also signaled how it intends to compete with Apple Inc.’s iOS ecosystem through software partnerships.The new Galaxy S20 devices will feature deep integration of Netflix Inc., allowing users to search for movies by voice queries to the Bixby digital assistant. Bixby’s morning routines will also include Spotify Technology SA music streaming, and Microsoft Corp.’s Xbox Game Studios will debut its Forza Street title on Samsung’s Galaxy Store for apps.“It’s been amazing to see Samsung continuously push the limits of what’s possible,” said Hiroshi Lockheimer, Google’s Android chief. Google’s operating system has been helped by and risen in parallel to Samsung’s emergence as the world’s most prolific smartphone maker.Rival Apple is on a mission to develop its own content such as Apple Music, Apple TV+ and Apple Arcade, a set of in-house subscription services that the company is spending lavishly on to make it a success. Each of them benefits from its hundreds of millions of iPhones already in users’ hands and they help enhance and strengthen the company’s protected ecosystem.Samsung has made similar efforts, such as its Samsung Milk music service, and repeatedly failed. Its chronic problem in competing with Apple has been the absence of unique and differentiated experiences -- an iPhone owner has access to Netflix and Spotify as well as to the Apple-exclusive iOS services.The partnerships announced alongside the flashy new Galaxy phones “will be critical if the company is to elevate itself beyond hardware, diversify revenue and level the playing field with Apple,” said Ben Wood of CCS Insight.Analysts now believe Samsung is on the right track by looking to deepen collaboration with content distributors threatened by Apple’s strategy. “It hasn’t been proven to work yet, but it’s a much better strategy than Samsung trying to compete in content and enterprise apps itself,” said Avi Greengart, mobile industry analyst at Techsponential. “The cost and risk of trying to recreate Spotify, Netflix, Office or xCloud is astronomical.”IDC analyst Raquel de Condado Marques liked the synergy between Samsung’s newly upgraded hardware and service partnerships, especially in gaming. With faster mobile internet speeds and better displays, “Samsung is leveraging what it does best -- hardware -- and allowing new partners to do the same by relying on Microsoft’s PC installed base and Xbox gaming heritage to provide a more complete platform across different technologies.”Microsoft is developing its xCloud game-streaming service, a rival to Google Stadia, which will let people experience desktop-like graphics and sophistication on their mobile devices. Netflix has a whole set of criteria as to what makes a Netflix Recommended TV, which it uses to incentivize electronics makers to present its content in the best possible form. Both companies can benefit from having a role-model mobile hardware platform, such as Samsung’s Galaxy S20 family, to demo their best mobile offerings and to direct other manufacturers to emulate.Microsoft Bets on South Korea as Test Bed for 5G Cloud GamingNot all are convinced by Samsung’s approach to tie-ups. “There was no shortage of big names,” said Wood of CCS Insight. “But the partnerships appeared to hold limited potential to build a deep services ecosystem.”Still, the South Korean tech giant is a powerful draw. “Samsung -- like Apple and Huawei -- has its own center of gravity,” said Techsponential’s Greengart, adding that it’s capable of commanding attention through its events and products. That makes it an appealing partner for other big industry names and gives the company some assurance that it won’t succumb to the same fate that other pure hardware vendors, such as HTC Corp.’s smartphone business, have fallen prey to in the past.To contact the reporters on this story: Vlad Savov in Tokyo at vsavov5@bloomberg.net;Sohee Kim in Seoul at skim847@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Edwin Chan at echan273@bloomberg.net, Colum MurphyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
