Getty Images Long accepting of requests to assign royalties to third parties, UMG now wants artists and investors to figure it out. Universal Music Group, the world’s largest music company, is no longer accepting letters of direction for the sale of royalty streams, Billboard has learned. That means that -- at a time when the market for various kinds of music royalties is exploding -- investors who have purchased some or all of an artist, songwriter, producer, engineer or side performer’s revenue stream on a sound recording or composition owned or controlled by UMG will now need to coordinate that payment directly through the artist or songwriter with whom the label and publisher has a deal.