What purpose does it serve. Any investor looking to invest in WMG isn't going to do so because they own some spotify. If someone wants to invest in Spotify the

What purpose does it serve. Any investor looking to invest in WMG isn't going to do so because they own some spotify. If someone wants to invest in Spotify they will go buy some spotify stock. It doesn't serve investors to have some of their capital tied up in an unrelated stock. The normal reason for having stock in another company is in order to get favourable terms in a negotiation - which I do think could be useful here, but isn't always the case.