The suit is over the failure to crack down on resellers.
Transcript:
Are concert goers getting ripped off?
The U.S. government and seven states are taking on Ticketmaster and its parent, Live Nation, over widespread ticket scalping. The lawsuit claims Ticketmaster has allowed brokers to grab millions of tickets and resell them at huge markups – forcing fans to pay way more than face value.
The FTC says Ticketmaster uses “bait-and-switch” pricing, hides fees until the last step, and falsely claims purchase limits – while brokers routinely ignore those limits. Internal emails reportedly show the company knew about this and provided tools like TradeDesk to help brokers manage bulk buys.
Ticketmaster controls about 80% of U.S. concert ticket sales. From 2019 to 2024, fans spent $82.6 billion on tickets – money the lawsuit says Ticketmaster profited from while keeping ordinary fans out.
FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson said: “American live entertainment should be accessible to all of us. It should not cost an arm and a leg to see a game or your favorite artist.”
That’ll do it for your daily briefing. From the New York Stock Exchange, I’m Caroline Woods with TheStreet.
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