Thank you to everyone who joined us for our Annual Membership Meeting last month! We were excited to share the progress we’ve made over the past year in membership growth and the total amount of royalties we’ve processed, which has now surpassed $5 billion.
During the Annual Membership Meeting, we also announced our plans to begin market share distributions in April 2027. In this newsletter, you’ll find a recap of the meeting, along with a link to watch the recording. And as always, we share the key metrics from this month’s royalty distribution, along with our latest enhancements to The MLC Portal.
The MLC completed its tenth royalty distribution of the year on October 14. October’s distribution primarily covered newly reported usage that took place in July 2026. The total of all royalty pools reported to The MLC for this cycle was approximately $91.0 million.
Every month, our team attempts to match the newly reported sound recording uses we receive to the musical works data in our public database and then distributes the resulting matched royalties to our Members. This month, we were able to match over 83 percent of the total royalty pools reported to us by DSPs primarily for their July 2026 usage to songs registered in our database. After deducting $1.6 million in royalties for usage covered by voluntary licenses maintained by DSPs with rightsholders, we collected approximately $89.4 million in royalties and distributed approximately $67.2 million to our Members.
To learn more about our October 2026 distribution, click here:
We continued to process adjustments to blanket royalties for usage originally reported during the last two years of the Phono 3 rate period (i.e., 2021 and 2022). These adjustments represent the difference between the royalties we initially processed for the usage periods from those two years at the Phono 2 rates and the royalties that are due at the final Phono 3 rates. In the October distribution, we processed blanket royalty adjustments for Apple’s Q4 2021 usage in the amount of $3.5 million and Apple’s July-November 2022 usage in the amount of $2.8 million.
As we previously shared with you, certain Phono 3 adjustments reported by Spotify and Apple were not allocated correctly among the individual offerings reported by each service, which resulted in overpayments or underpayments to some Members. This did not impact the total amount of adjustments we previously processed for either DSP. We have already resolved the issue on a prospective basis, and corrections related to previously processed Apple adjustments were included in our June distribution. In the October distribution, we processed corrections to Spotify’s previously processed adjustments for 2021 (January-June, September, November, and December) usage.
This month, we also continued to process adjustments for 2023 delivered to us by certain DSPs in connection with their Annual Reports of Usage (ARoU). In the October distribution, we processed blanket royalty adjustments for Spotify’s January 2023 usage in the amount of $1.4 million. We also processed blanket royalty adjustments for Apple’s Q3 2023 usage, which reflected a net overpayment of $975k.
Also in the October distribution, we reprocessed adjustments to royalties originally reported in 2021, 2022, and 2023, and the resulting royalties totaled approximately $482k.
To the extent the royalties from these adjustments pertained to works in your catalog, you will see them identified on your statement by the category type ["Adjustments"], along with the name(s) of the specific DSP(s) for which the adjustments were made.
To read more about this month's blanket updates, including recent changes to DSPs operating under the blanket license, click here:
Starting in April 2024, we began initially processing matched historical royalties for the Phono 3 rate period in sets. For each set of royalties from a given DSP (or DSPs), we would first distribute matched historical royalties for previously unpaid uses reported by the DSP(s) concerned, then we would aim to distribute matched historical royalties for previously partially paid uses from the same DSP(s) the following month. Utilizing this two-step process, we have now initially processed the historical royalties we received from every DSP, except for FanLabel and Weav. We will inform Members in a future newsletter once we have scheduled FanLabel and Weav for processing.
Although we have largely finished initially processing these historical royalties, we continue to reprocess the remaining historical royalties from all three rate periods. This reprocessing resulted in our distribution of an additional $1.2 million in historical royalties this month, broken down as follows:
$7k in royalties for the Phono 1 rate period (2007-2012);
$222k in royalties for the Phono 2 rate period (2013-2017); and
$1.0 million in royalties for the Phono 3 rate period (2018-2020).
We will continue to reprocess the remaining historical royalties in order to distribute even more of these royalties. To read more about the historical royalties we have distributed so far, click here:
The Overclaims Tool enables Members to view and resolve overclaims, which occur when the total ownership shares submitted by all Members for a registered work add up to more than 100%. This month, we’ve introduced two enhancements that will allow Members to manage overclaims more efficiently.
The Overclaims Tool allows Members to upload documentation to support their claimed ownership shares. In April, we added a document library where Members can save uploaded documents for future use, making it easier to access supporting documentation. Now, if a Member attempts to upload a document that’s already in their library, an alert will indicate that the document is a duplicate, and their existing file will be used, saving Members from uploading the same document twice.
Based on Member feedback, we’ve also expanded search capabilities within the Overclaims Tool. Members were already able to search for overclaims by Work Title, MLC Song Code, or Overclaim ID. This month, we’ve added the ability to search by Writer Name and Writer IPI, with Publisher Name search planned for next month. These additional search options give Members even more ways to find specific works in their catalogs that are subject to overclaims.
We hope you find these updates helpful! Stay tuned for more enhancements coming soon.
We hope you were able to join us for our Annual Membership Meeting last month. In case you missed it, here’s a look at some of the key metrics and milestones we shared. As of September 29:
The MLC had processed nearly $5 billion in total royalties and distributed over $4.2 billion in total royalties to rightsholders.
The MLC had distributed nearly $239 million in historical royalties — over 60 percent of the total amount of historical unmatched royalties DSPs were unable to match and distribute before transferring them to The MLC.
The MLC had enrolled more than 100,000 Members, welcoming more than 27,000 new Members so far in 2026.
The MLC had compiled data for more than 60 million works in its public database, with more than 8 million new works added so far in 2026.
The MLC’s match rate for all royalties processed through September’s royalty distribution was over 92 percent.
The MLC has continued to enhance its growing suite of tools that enable rightsholders to register works, claim their shares of previously registered works, submit proposed matches of their works to unmatched usage, and more.
The MLC’s Songwriter Hub had grown to more than 20,000 users, providing songwriters whose royalties are managed by a publisher or administrator greater visibility into the data The MLC has for their songs, along with tools to help organize and manage their catalogs.
The MLC has continued its extensive outreach and educational efforts aimed at reaching the full cross-section of the rightsholder community, with more than 1,300 events attended since its inception — including nearly 200 events so far in 2026.
The MLC also announced the re-selection of Kevin Kadish and Troy Verges as Songwriter Directors of the Board, and the re-election of Alisa Coleman as a Publisher Director of the Board.
During our Annual Membership Meeting, we announced our plans to begin market share distributions in April 2027, starting with remaining unclaimed accrued blanket royalties reported to The MLC for January 2021 usage. As a reminder, under the Music Modernization Act, any remaining unclaimed accrued royalties (which include unmatched and unclaimed royalties) must eventually be distributed to rightsholders through a market share distribution process. You can find more information and FAQs about the market share process here.
As market share distributions approach, now is the perfect time to review and update your data with The MLC. The tools within the Member Hub make it easy to review the data The MLC has for your songs, claim your shares of registered songs, register any songs that aren’t yet in The MLC’s database, and review unmatched sound recordings to suggest matches to songs in your catalog. Taking these steps now will help ensure your catalog is in order before market share distributions begin.
If you know anyone who still needs to connect with The MLC, you can point them to our Get Started page here.
