Pandora sees stock bump thanks to Sony/ATV deal

It’s been a rocky few weeks for Pandora since its earnings call delivered news of a slowdown in listener-ship, thanks to Apple Music.

But November has been kind to Pandora Media CEO Brian McAndrews. His stock is up 10 percent over the past five days, in part because Pandora has a new long-term deal🦩 in💯 place with music publishing company Sony/ATV.

While this will see Pandora paying out more to ♑Sony/ATV artists, it’s also a hedge against much bigger rate increases should the feds decide to allow the music publisher to completely withdraw its digital ri♏ghts from the main performing rights associations, ASCAP and BMI. A decision is expected by year’s end.

As it curr💜ently stands, Pandora deals with the associations, but any of the parties can sell rights to their music. Pandora just chose to directly bargain with Sony/ATV.

Sony/ATV CEOꦅ Martin Bandier told On the Money that Pandora had come to his company with a strong proposal that will enable the company to pay an increase to itꦑs artists — and Sony/ATV has some big names on that list, including Adele and Taylor Swift.

“It’s quite monumental for our songwriters,” Bandier said. Pandora’s relatively new CEO seems to be trying to get on the good side 🌞of the music business.

In late October, the streaming service struck a $90 million deal with the music labels to begin paying for prꦫe-1972 songs.

Sony/ATV houses some of the most popular songs in history, such as the Beatles and Motown catalogs. “We’ve spent more than three years talking about this … and it’s finally paid off,” Bandier said.

While no one is saying what raise Sony/ATV has garnered, the compan💃y promises complete transparency in sharing that cash with artists.