Spotify hits subscriber targets in race with Apple Music

LONDON (Reuters) - Music streaming leader Spotify’s (SPOT.N) paid subscribers rose 10 percent in the second quarter, it said on Thursday, as it races to stay ahead of mounting competition from Apple Music (AAPL.O), especially in the U.S. market.

FILE PHOTO: The Spotify logo is displayed on a screen on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., May 3, 2018. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

Monthly paying subscribers, which account for the bulk of Spotify’s revenue, rose to 83 million at the end of June from 75 million in the first three months of 2018 and more than double Apple’s last-reported 40 million paid users.

The figure, reported in just the second financial report since the Swedish company’s April debut on the New York Stock Exchange, topped the 82 million average estimate in a Reuters poll of analysts.

Revenue growth, however, was slowed by new European data privacy rules that require users to give explicit consent for certain uses of their information. Second-quarter revenue rose 26 percent to 1.27 billion euros ($1.49 billion).

“We did see some GDPR disruption across our European markets during Q2 but seem to be largely past that now,” the company said in a statement, referring to the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation that came into effect in May.

Spotify, which launched its streaming music service a decade ago, has seen a surge in subscriber growth in recent years.

The rising popularity of subscription services are seen as a primary factor driving the improved financial health of the music industry.

Reporting by Eric Auchard in London; editing by Adrian Croft and Jason Neely

(Original source)