Universal Music Group has been valued at around €45bn (£38bn/$52bn) after it made its stock market debut today (Tuesday) in Amsterdam, according to reports.
French media conglomerate, and owner of Universal Music Group, Vivendi floated a 60% stake in UMG to its shareholders. It is reported that the big winners from the Amsterdam listing include US hedge fund billionaire William Ackman, Vivendi’s controlling shareholder Vincent Bollore and China’s Tencent.
Ballore used to be the chairman of Vivendi.
UMG has an extensive song catalogue and represents artists from the likes of young star Billie Eilish through to iconic band, The Beatles.
Vivendi also owns other brands such as UK-born ticketing company See Tickets. The French company originally acquired See Tickets in 2011 for €96m.
Over the last couple of years, Vivendi and See Tickets have gradually expanded its network in Europe and the US.
Just before the beginning of the global pandemic in January 2020, See Tickets acquired Swiss company Starticket from TX Group.
Starticket worked with over 750 event promoters and sold over five million tickets annually.
Back in 2018, See Tickets also acquired Paylogic, a ticketing and technology company based in Amsterdam, from live events and digital entertainment producer LiveStyle.
The acquisitions resulted in See Tickets being present in markets in the UK, France, the US, Spain, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands.
Universal’s shares were trading at around €25 euros by mid-session, which is up about 35% on it reference price of €18.50.
Vivendi will now own 10.13% of Universal’s shares.
Image: Joshua Hoehne on Unsplash
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