This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.
Business News Labels & Publishers Top Stories
IFPI publishes stats report providing more insights on record industry’s slight growth in 2012
By Chris Cooke | Published on Tuesday 9 April 2013
The International Federation Of The Phonographic Industry yesterday published its Recording Industry In Numbers report for 2013, which mainly confirms trends and achievements of which we already knew, though does so with some more detail in terms of stats.
As confirmed by the IFPI’s Digital Music Report in February, the global record industry saw its revenues (generated by recorded music) increase ever so slightly in 2012, the first increase since 1999 (though actually, the size of that increase, originally estimated at 0.3%, is now reckoned to be 0.2%). Ever growing digital revenues, including those from the rapidly expanding subscription and streaming service domain, coupled with boosted income from a number of emerging markets, combined to help compensate for the continued decline in physical product sales.
Indeed all of the various sound recording related revenue streams that the IFPI tracks saw growth last year, with the all important exception of physical records of course. Overall digital accounts for 35% of the wider record industry’s global trade revenues, of which downloads still account for around 80%, though in Europe subscription and streaming sets ups are now bringing in a third of digital income.
While digital overall accounts for just over a third of total income, physical products bring in 57% of the money worldwide. The rest comes from other licensing-based revenue streams, chiefly performance rights, which was actually the fastest growing part of the record industry last year, and now accounts for 6% of income overall, while sync also saw some albeit modest growth in 2012.
In terms of emerging markets, Brazil, India and Mexico are picked out by the IFPI as being amongst the most crucial, them having seen market growth of 24%, 42% and 17% respectively since 2008. Unsurprisingly given those stats, India is slowly moving up the list of most lucrative recorded music markets, as is Sweden, it being arguably the most mature digital market. Though the US, Japan, Germany, UK and France remain the biggest markets overall, in that order.
Commenting on the latest batch of IFPI stats, that can be bought online for a mere £750 if you’re hungry for all the figures, the trade body’s boss lady Frances Moore told CMU: “This is a must-read publication for anyone following the global music industry. It is packed with the latest data and analysis, broken down by formats, revenue streams, regions and countries. Recording Industry in Numbers also reveals the sheer diversity of the modern music business. Notable highlights in this year’s edition are the increasing role of subscription services and the growing importance of emerging markets in driving the industry’s recovery”.
