The Kindle Unlimited KENP rate payment for July sank to $0.0040 from $0.0042 in June despite the KDP Select Global Fund rising by $1 million to a record high of $19 million.
The KENP rate has now plunged by 23% since December 2016 when it stood at $0.0052. Looking at the seasonal trend, in July 2016, the KENP rate was $0.0048, so the fall over the year since then is 16%.
Amazon introduced an updated version of KENP earlier this month (August 2017) — KENP v3.0, but this appears to have largely kept page counts steady at the levels of KENP v2.0 and is being seen largely as a bid to address the ‘page-flip’problem.
International KENP rates for July include:
- UK: £0.0030 (down from £0.0032 in June)
- Germany: €0.0027 (same as June)
- Japan: ¥0.50 (down from ¥0.52 in June)
After several monthly rises recently of just $100,000, the KDP Select Global Fund was boosted by $1 million to $19 million in July from $18 million in June.
Dividing the July 2017 KDP Select fund of $19 million by the US KENP rate of $0.0040 gives a total of around 4.75 billion KENPs read during the month, up by 11% from 4.28 billion in June. Figures for previous months were 4.16 billion KENPs in May and 3.95 billion KENPs for April.
As well as this steady growth in borrows, one of the reasons for the continuing downward trend in KENP rates could be pressure on the overall Kindle Unlimited division from the huge popularity of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale and several Harry Potter titles by J K Rowling.
Since these became available under Kindle Unlimited they have dominated the Amazon Charts. The Handmaid’s Tale has been on the Most Read Top 20 (which includes KU borrows) for 14 weeks and is at No 2 this week. There are seven Harry Potter ebooks in the Most Read Top 20 this week and they’ve been there from between seven weeks and 14 weeks.
As these titles are not signed up to KDP Select the cash used to pay the royalties will not be coming from the KDP fund but it must be putting financial pressure on the overall Kindle Unlimited division.
It’s also unlikely that they are being paid at the same level as the KENP rate as Amazon has previously been reported as offering payments to more traditional publishers at the same level as a sale if they sign up for Kindle Unlimited.
The introduction of Prime Reading may also have added to the financial pressure, with Amazon bringing in a scheme where Prime members can borrow for free from a rotating selection of 1,000 ebooks and magazines.
The US KENP payout figures since KENP v2.0 was introduced are:
2016
- February: $0.0047
- March: $0.0047
- April: $0.0048
- May: $0.0046
- June: $0.0049
- July: $0.0048
- August: $0.0045
- September: $0.0049
- October: $0.0052
- November: $0.0053
- December: $0.0052
2017
- January: $0.0047
- February: $0.0049
- March: $0.0046
- April: $0.0045
- May: $0.0043
- June: $0.0042
- July: $0.0040
The monthly KDP Select global fund totals since KENP v2.0 was introduced are:
2016
- February: $14 million
- March: $14.9 million
- April: $14.9 million
- May: $15.3 million
- June: $15.4 million
- July: $15.5 million
- August: $15.8 million
- September: $15.9 million
- October: $16.2 million
- November: $16.3 million
- December: $16.8 million
2017
- January: $17.8 million
- February: $16.8 million
- March: $17.7 million
- April: $17.8 million
- May $17.9 million
- June $18 million
- July: $19 million
Links to related articles:
Amazon brings in KENPC v3.0 to iron out Kindle Unlimited page-flip blips