Bowie bonds: fixed income

Bowie's 1997 bonds raised $55 million against royalties from his earlier music catalogue. Prudential bought them.

The songs could keep earning; the deal let him receive money up front instead of waiting for those royalties. The bondholder had a reason to care what was playing.

Raised by the bond issuance

$55,000,000

1997

A 1997 financing issuance, not an overdue personal bill and not a sign of financial distress. The citation is a 2002 entry on the artist's official site, which does not describe the issuance in its own words — it quotes a Q magazine piece. That is one hop further from the event than a citation normally implies, and the entry's comparison of the bonds' performance with government stock is its own claim, not adopted here. What happened next is settled and better documented than the entry: Moody's rated the issue A3 at the outset and cut it to Baa3 in March 2004, one grade above speculative, citing weaker recorded-music sales and a downgrade of the guarantor; the bonds were repaid in full at maturity in 2007. The drawn royalty notes illustrate the arrangement, not a measured cash-flow rate.