IMPF Board gathers to assess global impact of Covid on music publishing markets

The IMPF Board met virtually on the 1st June and held a ‘Tour de Table’ – to review the status quo in the various territories one year after Covid in relation to CMO collections, returning to live events, the economic impact and future plans.

IMPF Board Members from territories across the globe convened at the start of last week to give a state of play from their part of the world. The performance of each market in the face of the pandemic was assessed from a music publishing perspective, but members were also keen to outline progress in terms of national vaccination programmes and lockdown easing, which would hopefully provide a boost to income from live performance.

On average, revenue in music publishing sectors around the world dipped in the region of 20 – 25% in 2020 because of the Covid crisis – and most IMPF members expected to see a similar result in 2021.

There were a handful of markets with mitigating factors that helped cushion the blow, however. A 30 million Euro fund from STIM covered some of the damage across the Scandinavian territories, while 19 million Euros in state aid is yet to be distributed by SABAM in Belgium.

In Germany, Budde Music’s Ender Atis pointed to a statutory remuneration payment coming at just the right time.

“Blank tape levies paid out approximately 100 million Euros, which were collected as extra in that area,” he explained. “That helped to compensate, so I think we’re down about 10 – 15% in collections for GEMA.”

A similar windfall is primed in Africa, where SAMRO was able to license Netflix retrospectively for the past five years. IMPF Board members David Alexander and John Fishlock anticipated that payment coming through in the second half of 2021.

In the UK, Bucks Music Group MD Simon Platz also pointed to income from SVOD services such as Netflix and Disney+ as a significant help – with PRS revenues down 20% over the year and MCPS revenues flat. He also chalked up big settlements with TikTok and ongoing negotiations with Twitch as good news stories as well.

The sync market is also showing promising signs of rejuvenation in certain markets. In Brazil, Rocking Gorillas John Telfer said the sector was increasing again slowly but still only to a limited extent: “We’re not seeing any large international syncs because they’re for the high-end goods, and there aren’t so many being sold at the moment. The market has changed completely. So, we’re seeing Brazilian music being used more and more in the local domestic syncs.”

Others saw some further encouraging signs around sync.

In Japan, JASRAC is expecting a 38% boost in streaming offsetting dips in performance (down 16.9%), broadcasting (20%) and physical (down 9.7%), according to Fujipacific Music’s Ichi Asatsuma.

“I think the reason why digital is growing rapidly is because, up until three years ago, Japanese artists didn’t issue licenses for streaming services,” said Asatsuma. “In the last one or two years, they started to give licenses to the likes of Netflix and Apple. [Consumers] have started to realise that they can listen to these songs via streaming, which is growing the area.”