TIME----
Counting wasn't a problem for Michael Jackson in the 1970 hit "ABC." Love, he chirped in the Jackson 5 song he co-wrote, was as "easy as 1-2-3." When it came to handling the bigger sums the singer would go on to amass, though, Jackson never really got a grip on the numbers. Profligate spending, a slew of legal settlements and a reliance on ever increasing bank loans blew a hole in the fortune Jackson earned over four decades of performing. Some estimates put the singer's debt at the time of his death at $300 million. Others put him almost twice as far into the red.
That the King of Pop earned royal sums for his music, there's little doubt. Jackson pocketed more than $300 million from sales of his recordings since the early 1980s, according to The New York Times. Thriller, which was the top-selling album of all time until eclipsed by the Eagles' Greatest Hits, 1971-1975, brought in a reported $125 million for the singer in the years after its release in 1982. Though there were early signs of an inclination to spend — he apparently missed out on landing the bones of John Merrick, better known as the Elephant Man, despite bidding about $1 million for them in 1987 — Jackson showed early investment savvy. Shelling out $47.5 million in 1985 for the rights to a catalog of music that included 251 Beatles songs was a profitable move. Those rights, as well as concerts, endorsements and music videos, would generate more than $400 million over the next two decades.
Little else about his finances was as clever. Blessed with the regular rewards from the Beatles' music and his own, Jackson started to spend. He paid $17 million in 1988 for the 2,800-acre (roughly 1,000 hectares) ranch in California that would become Neverland. Maintaining the theme park — complete with zoo, movie theater and fairground — swallowed up about $5 million annually. As Jackson gradually retreated from work, the additional millions eaten up by plane charters, antiques, lavish gifts and legal disputes — a child-molestation case in the early 1990s cost Jackson around $20 million to settle — left a hole in his fortune. To help plug it, in 1995 the singer signed over to Sony a 50% stake in the rights to the Beatles' catalog in exchange for almost $100 million.
Things would get worse. With sponsors turned off by Jackson's private life — Pepsi and sneaker brand LA Gear, for instance, had backed him — he further lost control of his finances. Duff investments and a divorce settlement with Lisa Marie Presley helped push Jackson to increasingly use his earnings from music as collateral for loans, first from Bank of America (BoA), before Fortress Investment Group, a specialist in distressed debt, took the loans off BoA's hands. By the mid-2000s, Jackson was believed to be $270 million in debt.
With annual income from the sale of his and his catalog's music at around $19 million, according to the Wall Street Journal, Jackson was still stretched. When the singer defaulted on a loan in March last year, pushing Neverland into foreclosure, private-equity firm Colony Capital stepped in to bail him out. The 50 concerts planned for London later this year could have netted Jackson as much as $100 million, with a possible world tour to follow generating five times that amount. To Jackson's debtors, if not to the singer himself, that sure would have added up.
Michael Jackson's Estate Saved By The Beatles' Music Catalog
Will Michael Jacksons' three children, Michael Joseph Jr., Paris Michael and Prince Michael II, end up paupers? The answer rests on the value of the performer's largest asset: his 50% stake of a music publishing company called Sony/ATV Music Publishing.
Jackson, who died on June 25, left behind as much as $500 million of debts. That includes a $315 million loan owed to British bank Barclays, as well as millions of dollars of bills. "Jackson never paid his bills," says a lawyer who did work for Jackson over the years. "Countless professionals who worked for him are still waiting to get paid." In May, the singer's long-time publicist Raymone Bain sued Jackson for $44 million in unpaid fees.
But whether those debts will mean Jackson died bankrupt depends heavily on the worth of Sony/ATV. Jackson had other assets, including rights to many of his own songs, as well as about 1,000 hours of rehearsal footage leading up to this summer's London concert tour and possibly about a hundred unreleased songs. But none of those assets are likely to be nearly as valuable as his stake in Sony/ATV, which has been valued at anywhere from $390 million to $1 billion.
Jackson's 1985 purchase of ATV Music, which included in its catalog about 250 Beatles tunes, for $47.5 million formed the basis of his stake in the music publishing business, and was by far his shrewdest music deal. Yoko Ono, John Lennon's widow, and Paul McCartney had considered bidding a combined $20 million for the collection, but Ono decided that was more than the collection was worth. Jackson's purchase price of more than double that is still far less than what the songs would sell for now.
In 1995, Jackson agreed to merge ATV with Sony's music publishing business. The Japanese corporation paid Jackson $150 million to complete the deal, and split the ownership of the new company with the performer 50-50. In March 2007, an audit of Jackson's finances valued his half of Sony/ATV at $390 million.
But, just two years later, it is likely that Jackson's stake in Sony/ATV is worth much more than that. First of all, music publishing has not been hit nearly as bad by the shift to music downloads and away from compact discs as much as the rest of the industry. Unlike a record label, a music publisher does not only get paid when an album or other original recording of a song is sold. Publishers retain the rights to a song and get paid every time it is performed or appears in a movie or advertisement by the original artist or any other. "I have talked to a number of music publishers who tell me last year was their best year in a while," says Susan Butler, a former music industry lawyer who now writes a newsletter Music Confidential. "Guitar Hero and other games have created a lot of opportunity for the publishers."
What's more, in early 2007, Sony recruited industry veteran Martin Bandier, who turned rival EMI into a publishing powerhouse, to lead the unit. The hire seems to have paid off. Bandier has reenergized Sony's publishing company, completing a number of acquisitions and landing some popular new acts, including former American Idol contestant Elliott Yamin and rising music star Lady Gaga. Along with the Beatles, Neil Diamond and Bob Dylan, the company's 750,000-song catalog now includes the Jonas Brothers, Ruben Studdard and Taylor Swift. In the first quarter of this year, Sony/ATV ranked as the second largest music publisher in the U.S., with just under 20% of the market, up from a rank of fifth three years ago. Its Lady Gaga hit "Just Dance" was the best selling song in the first three months of the year. The result: Industry sources estimate Sony/ATV's revenue has grown more than 60% in the past two years to an annual $500 million. Net publisher's share, a closely watched figure in the industry, which is sales minus payments to artists, has doubled to an estimated $200 million. "The music publishing business is ripe with opportunities, and we are continuing to grow our business," says Bandier.
What does that mean Sony/ATV is worth? In a recent financial filing, Sony said the division had $1.3 billion in assets, and $479 million in debt. That would give the division a net value of about $850 million. But it would be likely to fetch much more than that in a sale. When Universal Music bought BMG Music Publishing in September 2006, Universal paid $2.1 billion or nearly 12 times BMG's estimated net publisher's share. Sony/ATV probably wouldn't get the same multiple in today's market. But even at 10 times its current publisher's earnings the company would be worth $2 billion.
Jackson, though, might not be able to sell his interest in Sony/ATV for its full $1 billion value. In 2006, as part of a deal to restructure his mounting debts, he gave Sony/ATV an option to buy half of his holdings in the company at a later date. Sony will not disclose the terms of that deal, but it probably limits what the Japanese company would have to pay Jackson for half of his Sony/ATV stake.
Still, the quarter of the publishing business that Jackson does own outright would be enough to clear out his debts. And Sony would still have to pay many millions for the rest, even with the option. The bottom line: Michael Jackson's estate is probably more than solvent. "People are focused on the amount of money Michael owed, but you have to look at the assets, too," says Ivan Thornton, who worked as financial advisor to Jackson on and off for the past decade. "He's in debt, but he is certainly not bankrupt."
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Sources: TIME, LA Late, Red Fin Blog, Google Maps, Wikimapia.org
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