Reports: Round Hill Music

The music catalogue acquisition market bounced back from a slightly cooled 2023 with a new fever in 2024. What is being bought is changing, however, as investors look to diversify their portfolios and uncover new growth pockets in an increasingly crowded market.

Catalogue was a real money spinner for the music industry throughout the sales era. First it underpinned the CD boom (convincing music fans to re-purchase old albums they already owned on prior formats). Then, through the emergence of the digital economy, it provided a stable respite from the volatility of declining overall revenues in the wake of P2P file sharing.

Everything starts with the song yet music publishers have often been the last part of the digital equation. Relative insulation from the effects of declining music sales have enabled publishers to have a far less digital centric worldview than record labels.