Really? This is new to me. What other artists did he do that to? If this is true... I guess Karma really is a BITCH!
“ The music publishing I own is fabulous. Beautiful. I owe it all to Linda's dad Lee Eastman and her brother John. Linda's dad is a great business brain. He said originally, 'If you are going to invest, do it in something you know. If you invest in building computers or something, you can lose a fortune. Wouldn't you rather be in music? Stay in music.' I said, 'Yeah, I'd much rather do that.' So he asked me what kind of music I liked. And the first name I said was Buddy Holly. Lee got on to the man who owned Buddy Holly's stuff and bought that for me. So I was into publishing now."
McCartney's music publishing investments have paid off. In 1984, he estimated that half his income came from recording, and half from his music publishing business.
Among his holdings are the entire Buddy Holly catalogue, "On Wisconsin," and "Autumn Leaves."