Live Nation/Ticketmaster sued in US for power in concert market

This article was last updated on May 24, 2024

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Live Nation/Ticketmaster sued in US for power in concert market

The US Department of Justice and several US states will sue Live Nation today. The concert organizer, together with its subsidiary Ticketmaster, is said to be too powerful on the concert ticket market. Various American media report this.

In the case, justice will argue that Live Nation/Ticketmaster has a virtual monopoly on major concerts by major artists and that this market power is being abused. Justice would demand that Live Nation and Ticketmaster become two separate companies again. Live Nation organizes concerts, Ticketmaster arranges ticket sales for concerts.

Years of research

Live Nation bought Ticketmaster in 2010. The American authorities then agreed, on the condition that Live Nation would not pressure concert halls to sell tickets through Ticketmaster. But that is indeed the case, according to the authorities.

Justice in the US has been investigating the market position of Live Nation/Ticketmaster for years. In 2022, there was a lot of buzz surrounding the sale of tickets for Taylor Swift’s concert tour. Ticketmaster had major technical problems with the presale of more than two million tickets. There were all kinds of error messages, people stood in online queues for hours or were simply thrown out. Many consumers also complain about extremely high prices and service charges for concerts by major artists.

‘Artist determines price’

In a previous response to criticism in America Live Nation said it is the artist who determines the ticket price. And the service costs are added “because two important players, the concert venue and the ticket company, receive little or nothing from the original ticket price.” “These are not ‘nonsense charges’ as venues and ticket companies incur costs for the services they provide.” According to Live Nation, in America the concert location and not Ticketmaster receives the largest share of the service costs.

Mojo

Live Nation also has a lot of power in the Netherlands. Concert and festival organizer Mojo is also owned by Live Nation and tickets for Mojo events are usually sold through Ticketmaster. For example, consumers complain that Ticketmaster makes it difficult or impossible to resell tickets through competitors such as Ticketswap.

So there was a fuss about it Lowlands tickets which you could only resell through Ticketmaster itself and where Ticketmaster earned up to 40 euros in service costs. In 2016, the Consumer & Markets Authority said that there was no reason to conduct further investigation into ticket (re)sale by Live Nation. “ACM concludes that the high prices are caused by supply and demand in the market,” the market watchdog said at the time.