Spotify’s business model is an unfinished symphony.

The digital-streaming service is closer to listing on the New York Stock Exchange now that it has secured licensing deals with all three major musical labels, including Warner Music, which signed up on Thursday. But with the likes of Universal and Sony reportedly budging only slightly on royalties, Spotify’s ability to turn a decent profit is still in doubt.

The company, a loss-making Swedish start-up led by Daniel Ek, renegotiated the licensing agreements in the hope of cutting the amount of money it pays in royalties. But if the terms of the Warner deal are anything like those reported for previous agreements, concerns about Spotify’s future profitability will persist.

The company has 140 million active users, 60 million of whom are paying subscribers, and made just over 2.9 billion euros in revenue in 2016. But its €2.5 billion cost of revenue – mostly payments to labels, publishers and other suppliers – meant little was left over to cover product development, marketing and administrative costs. The result was an operating loss of €350 million.

Young tech companies often put expansion before profitability. Take Netflix and Uber. But Spotify looks set to stay loss-making until at least the next round of royalty negotiations. Universal and Sony Music have accepted a cut to 52 cents a dollar from 55 cents, The Financial Times reported. Assume those terms apply across the board, and Spotify would still have made an operating loss of more than €260 million last year, according to Reuters Breakingviews calculations.