Every catalog acquisition starts in the same place. A data room opens, and inside sits the familiar furniture: a stack of royalty statements, some contract summaries, perhaps a seller-commissioned earnings report with a decay curve that always seems to flatten out at exactly the right moment (funny that). And at the centre of it all, the schedule of works- the document that defines what is actually for sale.

US termination rights have been somewhat of an industry secret in times gone by- and understandably so given their creator friendly purpose. For any not familiar, this is the legal right of a songwriter to reclaim US rights they have previously transferred (say under a publishing deal) after 35 years. These sit quietly inside a catalog for years, sometimes decades, looking like a future technicality rather than a present commercial issue.