How are all of these companies able to buy musicians’ music catalogs for hundreds of millions of dollars?

Question

I just read that Sony bought the rights to Pink Floyd’s catalog for something like $400 million. They also bought Bruce Springsteen’s catalog for around $500 million. That’s close to $1 billion for just two artists. There’s a whole bunch of other artists who are also getting bought out which brings the grand total to billions of dollars.

How are these companies getting the money to pay these crazy sums?

What is their plan to make that money back? Commercials and film placement?

Seems like you’d have to wait a veeeery long time to recoup these investments.

In: Economics

Answer 1

You do realize royalties get paid to rights owners anytime a song they own is played whether TV, film, radio, streaming, in retail stores etc. When it comes to Springsteen it makes a lot more sense re making that money back quicker than you think.