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Spotify (SPOT)
NYSE:SPOT

Spotify (SPOT) AI Stock Analysis

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SPOT

Spotify

(NYSE:SPOT)

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Neutral 65 (OpenAI - 5.2)
Rating:65Neutral
Price Target:
$527.00
▲(7.42% Upside)
Action:ReiteratedDate:02/12/26
The score is driven primarily by materially improved profitability, margins, and strong free cash flow, reinforced by constructive Q1 2026 guidance and management’s expectation for further margin and cash flow gains. These positives are tempered by very weak technicals (sharp downtrend with negative momentum) and a premium valuation that leaves less room for execution missteps, alongside near-term risks around advertising softness, FX headwinds, and potential churn from pricing.
Positive Factors
Margin expansion and profitability
Material margin expansion from prior losses to sustained operating profitability indicates durable operating leverage. Higher gross and operating margins enable reinvestment, support buybacks and debt flexibility, and improve resilience to slower ad cycles, strengthening long-term cash generation.
Strong free cash flow and cash reserves
Robust FCF and a large cash stockpile provide strategic optionality: fund product investment, opportunistic buybacks, repay convertible debt, or pursue M&A. High FCF conversion to net income signals earnings quality and reduces reliance on capital markets over a multi‑quarter horizon.
Scale and AI-driven engagement
Wide-scale AI features and deep engagement from large user base strengthen retention and monetization potential. AI-driven personalization supports ARPU gains and stickiness across premium and ad tiers, creating a durable product differentiation that compounds with scale.
Negative Factors
Weak advertising growth
Sluggish ad growth constrains revenue diversification and leaves the firm exposed to premium pricing and subscription sensitivity. Structural ad recovery may be slow and podcast optimization trade-offs suggest monetization of the ad channel requires sustained execution to support long-term topline.
Inconsistent top-line growth
Revenue volatility undermines the durability of recent margin gains; sustaining margin expansion depends on consistent revenue growth. If premium ARPU, marketplace, or ad recovery underperform, margins could compress and cash generation gains may be harder to maintain over multiple quarters.
AI-related content moderation risk
AI-driven content proliferation raises moderation costs, royalty leakage, and brand/UX risk. Persistent low-quality uploads can reduce engagement and ad effectiveness, forcing higher content governance spend and potential regulatory scrutiny, pressuring margins and long-run product trust.

Spotify (SPOT) vs. SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY)

Spotify Business Overview & Revenue Model

Company DescriptionSpotify Technology S.A., together with its subsidiaries, provides audio streaming services worldwide. It operates through Premium and Ad-Supported segments. The Premium segment offers unlimited online and offline streaming access to its catalog of music and podcasts without commercial breaks to its subscribers. The Ad-Supported segment provides on-demand online access to its catalog of music and unlimited online access to the catalog of podcasts to its subscribers on their computers, tablets, and compatible mobile devices. The company also offers sales, marketing, contract research and development, and customer support services. As of December 31, 2021, its platform included 406 million monthly active users and 180 million premium subscribers in 184 countries and territories. The company was incorporated in 2006 and is based in Luxembourg, Luxembourg.
How the Company Makes MoneySpotify generates revenue primarily through two key streams: premium subscriptions and advertising. The premium subscription model allows users to pay a monthly fee for an ad-free experience, offline listening, and enhanced audio quality. This tier has become a significant source of revenue, as millions of users are attracted to the benefits of a paid subscription. Additionally, Spotify offers a free tier supported by advertisements, where users can listen to music with certain limitations and interruptions from ads. Advertising revenue comes from brands that pay to promote their products or services to Spotify's vast user base. Furthermore, Spotify has engaged in strategic partnerships with various companies and artists to enhance its offerings and reach, contributing to its overall earnings.

Spotify Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Any
Any
Revenue by Geography
Revenue by Geography
Breaks down revenue across different regions, revealing where Spotify is strongest and where it may face risk or growth potential due to local economic conditions or market share shifts.
Chart InsightsSpotify's revenue growth in the United States and Other Countries remains robust, driven by strong user engagement and strategic product innovations, including video podcasts and audiobooks. The UK market, however, shows a sudden drop to zero, possibly due to operational changes or market exit. Despite challenges in advertising and potential churn from price hikes, Spotify's overall performance is buoyed by surpassing 700 million MAUs and successful price retention strategies, indicating a resilient business model poised for continued expansion.
Data provided by:The Fly

Spotify Earnings Call Summary

Earnings Call Date:Feb 10, 2026
(Q4-2025)
|
% Change Since: |
Next Earnings Date:Apr 29, 2026
Earnings Call Sentiment Positive
The call emphasized robust user growth, accelerating premium revenue, expanding margins, strong cash generation, and significant product and AI-driven engagement milestones. Management acknowledged near-term challenges in advertising growth, currency headwinds, AI-related content moderation risks, and potential quarterly margin variability, but presented clear plans and optimism for 2026 execution, monetization, and further AI-driven product differentiation.
Q4-2025 Updates
Positive Updates
Strong Top-Line Growth
Total revenue grew 13% year-over-year to $4,500,000,000 in Q4 2025, and full-year 2025 revenue also grew 13%.
Premium Revenue Acceleration
Premium revenue rose 14% year-over-year in Q4 (up from 13% last quarter), driven primarily by subscriber growth and pricing actions.
MAU and Subscriber Momentum
Monthly Active Users surpassed three-quarters of a billion; Q4 marked the highest quarter ever for MAU net additions (added ~38,000,000 users in Q4). Q1 2026 outlook: 759,000,000 MAU (+8,000,000 vs Q4) and 293,000,000 subscribers (implying ~3,000,000 net additions in Q1).
Improved Profitability and Margins
Q4 gross margin expanded to 33.1% (up ~80 basis points YoY). Operating income was €701,000,000, €81,000,000 above forecast. Full-year operating income grew in excess of 50% delivering a 13% full-year margin.
Record Cash Flow and Strong Balance Sheet
Q4 free cash flow was $834,000,000; company ended the quarter with $9,500,000,000 in cash and short-term investments. Full-year free cash flow improved by ~ $600,000,000 to a record DKK 2,900,000,000.
Active Capital Returns
Repurchased $433,000,000 of shares in Q4 and $510,000,000 in 2025; company plans to continue opportunistic buybacks and manage a SEK 1,500,000,000 convertible note due in March.
Product Innovation and Engagement
Launched 50+ new features in 2025 (e.g., Prompted Playlists, Page Match, About This Song). Wrapped engagement: >300,000,000 users engaged (+20%) and >630,000,000 social shares (+42%); day one of Wrapped was the highest single day of subscriber intake in company history.
AI Adoption Driving Usage
AI DJ has been used by ~90,000,000 subscribers, driving >4 billion hours of listening. Prompted Playlists and other AI features are boosting personalization and retention.
Content and Ecosystem Scale
Paid out >$11,000,000,000 to music rights holders in 2025 (highest annual payment from a single source), bringing lifetime payments to nearly $70,000,000,000. Podcast video consumption up >90% since SPP launch; >530,000 video podcast shows. Audiobook catalog tripled to >500,000 titles and expanded into 14 markets; audiobooks showing double-digit growth.
Marketplace & Mixing Momentum
Mixing tools milestone: 50,000,000 mixed playlists and >1,000,000 transitions per day. Marketplace contributed to gross income and margin expansion in 2025.
Negative Updates
Slow Advertising Growth
Advertising revenue grew just 4% year-over-year in Q4 (flat the prior quarter). On a like-for-like basis excluding podcast optimization effects, advertising grew ~7%, indicating ad business recovery is still nascent and requires further execution.
Podcast Optimization Trade-offs
Management noted podcast optimization strategies impacted ad growth in the prior period, suggesting short-term revenue trade-offs while reconfiguring podcast monetization.
Currency Headwinds
Forecast incorporates unfavorable currency movements that create an incremental €35,000,000 revenue headwind versus prior-quarter exchange rates for Q1 2026.
Content Moderation & Spam Risk from AI
Management acknowledged that AI can accelerate production of spammy tracks; while Spotify claims leadership in combating abuse, increased scale of low-quality uploads is an ongoing challenge.
Market Sentiment and Share Price Pressure
Analyst question noted the stock was down ~one-third over the last three months, reflecting market concern about AI-related disruption and competitive risks, signaling external perception risk despite company optimism.
Quarterly Margin Variability Risk
Company will invest disciplinarily in opportunities which could cause quarterly margin volatility; no full-year gross margin guidance was provided, leaving some uncertainty about margin cadence despite expectation of improvement in 2026.
Modest Near-Term Subscriber Additions (Seasonal)
Q1 2026 subscriber outlook implies ~3,000,000 net additions (a small seasonal quarter), which is within historical range but modest relative to scale and may temper expectations for near-term subscriber acceleration.
Company Guidance
Spotify guided Q1 2026 to 759,000,000 MAUs (up 8,000,000 from Q4) and 293,000,000 Premium subscribers (implying ~3,000,000 net adds in the seasonally small quarter), with total Q1 revenue of $4.5 billion (≈15% YoY growth), ARPU growth of 5–6%, a Q1 gross margin of 32.8% and operating income of $660 million; the outlook factors in an incremental €35 million FX headwind and churn from recent price increases that is in line with expectations. Management also expects both gross margin and operating margin to improve in 2026 (pricing expected to outpace net content cost), and free cash flow to meaningfully exceed 2025 while progressing toward a normalized long‑term tax rate; for context, 2025 full‑year revenue grew 13%, gross profit grew 20%, operating income rose >50% to a 13% full‑year margin, 2025 free cash flow was ~DKK 2.9 billion, Q4 free cash flow was $834 million, and cash & short‑term investments ended at $9.5 billion.

Spotify Financial Statement Overview

Summary
Financial results show a strong turnaround with expanding profitability and margins (net margin ~12.9% in 2025, operating margin ~14.5%, gross margin ~32%) and robust free cash flow generation (~$2.78B in 2025). Balance sheet leverage appears manageable (debt-to-equity ~0.28) with stronger equity, but the 2025 revenue decline and a slight dip in free cash flow growth add durability risk to the step-up in performance.
Income Statement
76
Positive
Spotify shows a clear profitability inflection: after losses in 2022–2023, 2024 turned profitable and 2025 expanded meaningfully, with net margin rising to ~12.9% (from ~7.3% in 2024) and operating margin improving to ~14.5% (from ~8.8%). Gross margin also strengthened to ~32.0% in 2025 (vs. ~30.1% in 2024). The main weakness is growth consistency—revenue declined in 2025 (~-2.3%) after solid growth in 2024 (~18.3%), suggesting top-line momentum is not yet stable.
Balance Sheet
74
Positive
The balance sheet appears stronger and less leveraged over time, with debt-to-equity improving to ~0.28 in 2025 from ~0.67 in 2023 (and ~0.36 in 2024). Equity has grown materially (to ~$8.3B in 2025 from ~$2.5B in 2023), supporting financial flexibility. Return on equity is strong in 2024–2025 (~20.6% to ~25.5%), reflecting improved profitability, though this comes after several years of negative returns, highlighting that the turnaround is relatively recent.
Cash Flow
70
Positive
Cash generation is a major positive: operating cash flow and free cash flow increased substantially versus earlier years, reaching ~$2.84B and ~$2.78B in 2025, respectively (vs. ~$0.68B/~$0.67B in 2023). Free cash flow tracks earnings closely (free cash flow to net income ~0.98–0.99 in 2024–2025), suggesting earnings quality is solid. Offsetting this, free cash flow dipped in 2025 (growth ~-5.2%) after improving in 2024, and the company’s operating cash flow relative to revenue remains moderate (~0.47–0.52 in 2024–2025), indicating cash conversion is good but not best-in-class.
BreakdownDec 2025Dec 2024Dec 2023Dec 2022Dec 2021
Income Statement
Total Revenue16.51B15.67B13.25B11.73B9.67B
Gross Profit5.28B4.72B3.40B2.93B2.59B
EBITDA2.49B1.50B-309.00M-158.00M416.00M
Net Income2.12B1.14B-532.00M-430.00M-34.00M
Balance Sheet
Total Assets15.01B12.00B8.38B7.57B7.19B
Cash, Cash Equivalents and Short-Term Investments9.46B7.45B4.23B3.32B3.51B
Total Debt2.32B2.00B1.70B1.67B1.79B
Total Liabilities6.68B6.48B5.85B5.19B5.07B
Stockholders Equity8.33B5.52B2.53B2.38B2.13B
Cash Flow
Free Cash Flow2.78B2.28B674.00M21.00M276.00M
Operating Cash Flow2.84B2.30B680.00M46.00M361.00M
Investing Cash Flow-1.74B-1.49B-217.00M-423.00M-187.00M
Financing Cash Flow-365.96M729.00M234.00M-40.00M1.25B

Spotify Technical Analysis

Technical Analysis Sentiment
Neutral
Last Price490.60
Price Trends
50DMA
527.20
Negative
100DMA
584.63
Negative
200DMA
639.00
Negative
Market Momentum
MACD
-15.03
Negative
RSI
50.38
Neutral
STOCH
79.15
Neutral
Evaluating momentum and price trends is crucial in stock analysis to make informed investment decisions. For SPOT, the sentiment is Neutral. The current price of 490.6 is above the 20-day moving average (MA) of 475.37, below the 50-day MA of 527.20, and below the 200-day MA of 639.00, indicating a neutral trend. The MACD of -15.03 indicates Negative momentum. The RSI at 50.38 is Neutral, neither overbought nor oversold. The STOCH value of 79.15 is Neutral, not indicating any strong overbought or oversold conditions. Overall, these indicators collectively point to a Neutral sentiment for SPOT.

Spotify Risk Analysis

Spotify disclosed 57 risk factors in its most recent earnings report. Spotify reported the most risks in the "Finance & Corporate" category.
Finance & Corporate - Financial and accounting risks. Risks related to the execution of corporate activity and strategy
Latest Risks Added 0 New Risks

Spotify Peers Comparison

Overall Rating
UnderperformOutperform
Sector (60)
Financial Indicators
Name
Overall Rating
Market Cap
P/E Ratio
ROE
Dividend Yield
Revenue Growth
EPS Growth
74
Outperform
$3.88T33.45152.02%0.38%
71
Outperform
$22.30B15.6614.47%1.02%13.86%80.97%
69
Neutral
$329.29B30.4742.76%15.49%35.54%
66
Neutral
$10.89B27.468.78%16.79%819.94%
65
Neutral
$98.30B39.0632.98%14.10%102.32%
60
Neutral
$48.67B4.58-11.27%4.14%2.83%-41.78%
59
Neutral
$15.28B50.5647.75%2.47%4.37%-16.22%
* Communication Services Sector Average
Performance Comparison
Ticker
Company Name
Price
Change
% Change
SPOT
Spotify
490.60
-111.01
-18.45%
AAPL
Apple
264.58
18.55
7.54%
NFLX
Netflix
78.67
-20.18
-20.41%
TME
Tencent Music Entertainment Group
15.20
2.38
18.54%
PINS
Pinterest
17.77
-19.18
-51.91%
WMG
Warner Music Group
29.89
-4.80
-13.84%

Spotify Corporate Events

Spotify Delivers Record Users, Margin Gains and €2.9 Billion Free Cash Flow in 2025
Feb 10, 2026

Spotify reported strong fourth-quarter and full-year 2025 results on February 10, 2026, with all key performance indicators meeting or exceeding guidance and record user growth. Monthly active users rose 11% year-on-year to 751 million, including 290 million premium subscribers, while revenue grew 7% to €4.53 billion (13% in constant currency), driven by premium subscription gains and improving ad-supported performance.

Profitability improved markedly, with gross margin reaching a record 33.1% and operating income climbing 47% year-on-year to €701 million, aided in part by lower-than-forecast social charges tied to share price movements. Free cash flow totaled €834 million in the quarter and €2.9 billion for 2025, reinforcing a cash-rich balance sheet of €9.5 billion as Spotify invests in features like Wrapped, music videos, audiobooks, and AI-powered personalization, underscoring its strengthened competitive position heading into 2026.

The most recent analyst rating on (SPOT) stock is a Buy with a $720.00 price target. To see the full list of analyst forecasts on Spotify stock, see the SPOT Stock Forecast page.

Spotify Elects New Board Members at Extraordinary Meeting
Dec 10, 2025

On December 10, 2025, Spotify Technology S.A. conducted an extraordinary general meeting where shareholders elected new members to the Board of Directors. Alex Norström and Gustav Söderström were elected as directors, with their terms starting on January 1, 2026. This election is significant as it may influence Spotify’s strategic direction and governance, impacting stakeholders and potentially affecting the company’s market position.

The most recent analyst rating on (SPOT) stock is a Buy with a $800.00 price target. To see the full list of analyst forecasts on Spotify stock, see the SPOT Stock Forecast page.

Glossary
BuyA stock rated as a "Buy" is expected to perform better than the overall market or a specific benchmark over the near-to-medium term. This rating suggests the stock is likely to deliver higher returns compared to other stocks in the same sector or market index. Note: This is not investment advice; please consult a financial advisor before making investment decisions.
HoldA stock rated as a "Hold" is expected to perform in line with the overall market or a specific benchmark. This rating indicates that the stock is neither particularly compelling nor unfavorable for investment. Note: This is not investment advice; please consult a financial advisor before making investment decisions.
SellA stock rated as a "Sell" is expected to perform worse than the overall market or a specific benchmark over the near-to-medium term. This rating suggests the stock may deliver lower returns compared to other stocks in the same sector or market index. Note: This is not investment advice; please consult a financial advisor before making investment decisions.

Disclaimer

This AI Analyst Stock Report is automatically generated by our AI systems using advanced algorithms and publicly available financial, technical, and market data. While the information provided aims to be accurate and insightful, it is intended for informational purposes only and should not be considered financial advice. Any content created by an AI (Artificial Intelligence) system may contain inaccuracies and/or contain errors. Investing in stocks carries inherent risks, and past performance is not indicative of future results. This report does not account for your personal financial circumstances, objectives, or risk tolerance. Always conduct your own research or consult with a qualified financial advisor before making investment decisions. The analysis and recommendations provided are based on historical and current data and may not fully reflect future market conditions or unexpected developments. Neither the creators of this report nor its affiliated entities guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of the information presented. Use this report at your own discretion and risk.Date of analysis: Feb 12, 2026