After a high-profile antitrust lawsuit, the US Department of Justice said on Monday that it has fixed with Ticketmaster and its parent company, Live Nation.
After merging in 2010, the combined Live Nation and Ticketmaster control the majority of ticket sales and venue bookings in the US, leaving talent with little choice but to work with these companies. Customers have been fed up for years with dynamic pricing issues that can raise the cost of tickets by thousands of dollars (often without consulting the artists), as well as the ticketing process — sales for Taylor Swift’s Eras tour were so onerous that they prompted a government audit.
According to the APthe settlement will require Live Nation to pay up to $280 million in fines and divest at least 13 venues to give competitors more opportunities. But the Attorneys General of several states involved in the lawsuit are not appeased by the settlement.
“The recently announced settlement with the US Department of Justice fails to address the antitrust issue at the heart of this case and would benefit Live Nation at the expense of consumers,” said New York Attorney General Letitia James. statement. “We can’t agree on that.”
Twenty-six of the thirty state attorneys general who sued the company along with the DOJ have chosen to join Attorney General James in continuing the lawsuit against Live Nation.
Washington Attorney General Nick Brown also said the settlement “does not adequately cure” the issue for concertgoers.
“For too long, Live Nation has raked in billions from a monopoly that has made it harder for consumers to see the artists they love, stifled artists and raised the price of tickets for countless music fans,” he said.
The trial had been ongoing for less than a week by the time the DOJ and Live Nation agreed to this settlement. However, some interesting testimony emerged during the trial.
John Abbamondi, former CEO of the NBA’s Brooklyn Nets and Barclays Center (where the Nets play), spoke about a decision he made in 2021 to work with a different ticketing company rather than Ticketmaster.
The ensuing phone call between Abbamondi and Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino was played in the courtroom and according to The New York Timesthe recorded conversation was combative and “laden with explosives.”
Abbamondi he told the jury Last week, Rapino made a comment on the call that he interpreted as a “veiled threat — maybe not so veiled a threat” that Live Nation would put on fewer concerts at Barclays Center as a result of the ticket change.
Living Nation was mentioned last month it sold over 646 million tickets last year and performed over 54,000 events internationally. In the US, Live Nation owns 150 venues and invested $1 billion last year to build an additional 18 live music venues.
