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One of three major global recorded-music and publishing companies, home to labels like Atlantic and Warner Records.
One of three major global recorded-music and publishing companies, home to labels like Atlantic and Warner Records.
Streaming platforms pay it each time its songs are played, so most revenue is recurring royalties from the catalogue, with new releases adding to it. Publishing earns when songs are streamed, played on radio or used in film and ads. Access Industries, Len Blavatnik's holding company, controls it.
Moat: narrow (scale, IP / patents, brand). Owns a large catalogue and long-term artist contracts generating durable royalty streams.
Headquarters: New York, US · Founded: 1958 · Employees: 5,500
Size Warner Music (WMG) is a United States Communication Services company (Commercial Printing/Forms) with a market value of $16.4B, the 565th largest of 3,117 United States companies the cockpit tracks. Shares closed at $31.30 on 6 Nov 2026.
Performance Over six months the shares fell 6.2%, against -2.4% for the median peer and -1.1% for the United States market (cap-weighted) — 10th lowest of 20 in its peer set.
Growth Revenue grew 12.9% over the last twelve months (peer median +10.8%); the operating margin is 18.8% (peer median 15.2%).
Valuation It trades at 19.0× forward earnings against a peer median of 13.6× (7th most expensive of 18).
Price implies For today's price to make sense, revenue must grow about 9% a year for seven years (Req g). Recent delivered growth is +8%, so the hurdle is +1 pp: the price needs faster growth than the company has been delivering — of companies that just grew 25–50% a year, 93.8% slowed down over the next four years.
Capital Return on invested capital runs 9.1 points above its cost of capital (10.1% WACC).
Backlog Backlog (remaining performance obligations) was $783M at 30 Jun 2026, down 44% on a year earlier — 0.1 years of trailing revenue. Backlog detail →
Short interest Short interest is 6.9% of the free float (15 Oct 2026).
Next results Next results expected around 19 Nov 2026 (exchange calendar; dates can move).
| TTM | FY2025 | FY2024 | FY2023 | FY2022 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $7.30B | $6.71B | $6.43B | $6.04B | $5.92B |
| Revenue growth | — | +4% | +6% | +2% | — |
| Gross profit | $2.93B | $2.70B | $2.74B | $2.53B | $2.50B |
| EBITDA | $1.79B | $1.50B | $1.54B | $1.18B | $1.08B |
| Net income | $665M | $361M | $429M | $424M | $544M |
| Free cash flow | $836M | $539M | $638M | $560M | $607M |
| Capital expenditure | $651M | $334M | $303M | $241M | $326M |
| Total debt | $4.92B | $4.61B | $4.29B | $4.26B | $4.01B |
The default views of Competitor Analysis ▸ Charts, drawn from the same data. Open them in the cockpit to change the axes, pin companies and read every value.
| Company | Market cap | 6M return | Revenue growth | Op. margin | Forward P/E | Req g |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Warner Music WMG | $16.4B | -6% | +13% | 19% | 19.0× | 9.3% |
| Universal Music UMG.AS | $35.3B | -15% | +5% | 16% | 16.9× | 7.1% |
| Sony Group Corporation Sponsored ADR SONY | $147B | +34% | -2% | 13% | 19.3× | 5.0% |
| Reservoir Media RSVR | $673M | 0% | +11% | 22% | 58.3× | 14.5% |
Peer set: Sector in the same market, nearest in size. This is the same default set the interactive Competitor Analysis opens with.
| Measure | WMG | Peer median | Rank in peer set |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1-month return | +8.3% | -0.1% | 4th highest of 21 |
| 6-month return | -6.2% | -2.4% | 10th lowest of 20 |
| Distance from 52-week high | -11.6% | -21.9% | 7th highest of 21 |
| Revenue growth (TTM) | +12.9% | +10.8% | 9th highest of 20 |
| Operating margin | 18.8% | 15.2% | 9th highest of 21 |
| Forward P/E | 19.0× | 13.6× | 7th most expensive of 18 |
| Growth the price implies (Req g, 7 yrs) | 9.3% | 2.7% | 6th most demanding of 17 |
| Growth delivered (Del g) | +8.5% | +6.4% | 7th highest of 17 |
| Hurdle (Req g minus delivered) | +0.8 pp | -7.3 pp | 3rd most demanding of 17 |
| ROIC minus cost of capital | +9.1 pp | +2.3 pp | 6th highest of 21 |
| EV / EBITDA | 11.7× | 8.9× | 7th most expensive of 17 |
| Net debt / EBITDA | 2.4× | 0.6× | 8th most indebted of 19 |
| Company | Market | Market cap | 6M return | Revenue growth | Op. margin | Forward P/E | Req g | Delivered g |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Warner Music WMG | United States | $16.4B | -6% | +13% | 19% | 19.0× | 9.3% | +8.5% |
| Telefonica Brasil SA Sponsored ADR VIV | United States | $18.2B | -27% | +16% | 16% | 10.7× | -3.6% | +5.0% |
| News Corp (Class A) NWSA | United States | $14.7B | -2% | +1% | 13% | 18.4× | 8.0% | -0.7% |
| Reddit RDDT | United States | $18.4B | -39% | +62% | 29% | 15.0× | 18.0% | +57.3% |
| Millicom International Cellular TIGO | United States | $13.9B | +3% | +29% | 23% | 22.9× | 3.6% | +6.9% |
| Charter Communications CHTR | United States | $20.8B | -24% | -2% | 24% | 3.1× | -8.5% | +2.6% |
| Charter Communications, Inc. Cum Red Pfd Shs Series A CHTRP | United States | $21.2B | n/a | -2% | 24% | 0.6× | -11.0% | +2.6% |
| AST SpaceMobile ASTS | United States | $12.6B | -57% | +2,257% | -410% | n/a | n/a | n/a |
| Omnicom OMC | United States | $23.6B | +13% | +54% | 15% | 7.9× | -6.9% | +5.6% |
| Roku ROKU | United States | $23.9B | +24% | +21% | 8% | 39.1× | 39.6% | +21.6% |
| New York Times NYT | United States | $11.0B | -14% | +11% | 17% | 21.9× | 8.9% | +9.6% |
| Globalstar GSAT | United States | $10.9B | +3% | +8% | 5% | n/a | n/a | n/a |
| SiriusXM SIRI | United States | $10.9B | +20% | +1% | 22% | 10.4× | -0.4% | +1.3% |
| Pinterest PINS | United States | $10.9B | -11% | +15% | 6% | 8.8× | 16.2% | +20.1% |
| PT Telkom Indonesia (Persero) Tbk Sponsored ADR TLK | United States | $10.3B | -35% | -3% | 24% | 9.5× | -16.1% | -1.1% |
| Fox Corporation (Class A) FOXA | United States | $26.4B | +6% | +9% | 23% | 11.8× | -9.8% | +5.8% |
| Liberty Media FWONA | United States | $27.3B | +18% | +12% | 12% | 51.0× | 29.0% | +31.4% |
| EchoStar ECHO | United States | $27.5B | -26% | -20% | 11% | 25.5× | n/a | n/a |
| Liberty Live Holdings, Inc. Registered Series -A- LLYVA | United States | $9.64B | +9% | n/a | -13% | n/a | n/a | n/a |
| DraftKings DKNG | United States | $9.19B | -27% | +15% | -3% | 55.1× | 9.7% | +58.0% |
| Match MTCH | United States | $8.88B | +6% | 0% | 30% | 13.6× | 1.8% | +7.8% |
Warner Music reported $783M of remaining performance obligations at 30 Jun 2026, down 44% from a year earlier and down 11% from the previous quarter. That is 0.1 years of trailing revenue already under contract. Book-to-bill last quarter: 0.95.