As FACTOR approaches the beginning of a new fiscal year, we have been asked what our strategy is with respect to integrating music consumption on streaming services for our artist clients.
FACTOR has been actively discussing this issue at the staff and Board level. The major obstacle to including streaming information is the lack of a comprehensive third party service that can be used by our clients and our staff to submit and then verify these data. This means that the service must cover both the US and Canada and eventually Europe and Asia, and include music consumption transactions collected at the granular level from all measurable streaming platforms, so that all artists who might apply to FACTOR can benefit equally. We anticipate that at least one suitable new data service will be available in the upcoming year. It is our intention to include those data in the artist rating provided the new service meets the above-stated criteria.
We would also like to remind our clients that company ratings, which are based on revenue from masters, already include streaming revenue which can be verified through the submission of financial statements.