Forbes magazine’s Great Speculations contributor page recently ran an article that suggested Pandora Media Inc (NYSE:P) should seriously consider any offer, were it to come to fruition, from Sirius XM Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:SIRI).

The argument is simple. Pandora is bleeding red ink; SIRI stock is at or near a five-year high.

Combine Sirius XM’s 34 million satellite radio subscribers with their 4 million paid subscribers, and you create a strong subscription/advertising business model that both Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Spotify will find pretty hard to beat.

Earlier this year, Liberty Media Group (NASDAQ:LMCA), which owns 65% of SIRI stock, informally offered to buy Pandora for $3.4 billion, or $15 per share. Pandora said no, hoping for $20 per share from Apple or one of its other deep-pocketed competitors.

Well, talks are apparently back on, and with no white knight on the horizon, Pandora is likely taking the latest approach more seriously. Whether anything happens is still up in the air, but it does beg the question whether investors should buy Sirius XM stock now or wait for Spotify to go public sometime in 2017.

Why not buy Pandora stock?

You could … but given it has already jumped around 20% in the past month on the SIRI takeover speculation and now trades over $13, the arbitrage upside might not be worth the risk. After all, the failure to do a deal would likely result in Pandora stock falling back below $12, where it was before talks reheated in early December.

A Pandora/SIRI combination would have $5.8 billion in annual revenue, $1 billion in operating income, 34 million paid subscribers and 74.5 million ad-based users. That would make it much larger than Apple Music, which has 20 million subscribers, a figure it got to in just 18 months.

Spotify, on the other hand, has about 40 million paid subscribers and another 60 million ad-based users. Spotify had an operating loss of $184.4 million in 2015 on $1.9 billion in revenue. Some speculate that the music streaming service could start making money in 2017 — a very convenient milestone given its potential IPO.

“Up until now, I think it’s been growth, growth growth,” Par-Jorgen Parson, a general partner at venture capital firm Northzone, recently told Reuters. ”Maybe profitability will start to become a priority too.”

Which Is the Better Buy: SIRI Stock or Spotify?

Well, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. While Spotify may go public and may soon be profitable, Sirius XM already is both of these.

At the end of 2015 …

• Spotify had $2 billion in subscription revenue, or $69.64 per paid subscriber, based on 28 million paid subscribers
• Pandora had $220.6 million in subscription revenue, or $56.56 per paid subscriber, based on 3.9 million paid subscribers
• Sirius XM had $3.8 billion in subscriber revenue or $157.37 per paid subscriber based on 24.3 million paid subscribers.

On the advertising front …

• Spotify generated $219.0 million in advertising revenue in 2015, or $3.59 per non-paying user.
• Pandora generated $933.3 million in advertising revenue in 2015, or $12.53 per non-paying user.
• Sirius XM generated $122.3 million in advertising revenue in 2015, or $4.13 per subscriber, based on its entire 29.6 million subscriber base — which includes 5.3 million paid promotional subscribers.

While it would make for a nice combination it’s hard to know whether a deal is going to happen. Together, Sirius XM and Pandora have over $1 billion in annual advertising revenue to go along with $4 billion in annual subscriber revenue, both substantially greater than Spotify’s numbers in 2015.

With or without Pandora, SIRI stock has done great things in recent years. InvestorPlace feature writer James Brumley recently pointed out, “SIRI stock is up 11% for the past year, up 26% for the past three years, and up 147% for the past five years.

That’s decent performance.

No, I’d buy SIRI stock and forget about Spotify until it’s been a public company for 18 months. If it’s making money at that point, I’d reconsider owning it — but not until then.

As of this writing, Will Ashworth did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.