Leadership / 09.25.18

Senators Question Ticketmaster, Live Nation on Alleged Scalper Collusion

Access Staff

Original article published on Variety (09/25/18) by Jem Aswad

U.S. Sens. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) have queried Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino concerning allegations made in a recent CBC/Toronto Star report that the company allowed ticket scalpers to use its TradeDesk program to access an online inventory of Ticketmaster's ticket supply with the goal of bypassing ticket sale caps to resell tickets at higher prices. "CBC News reported that Ticketmaster ... recruits and employs professional ticket scalpers to circumvent the ticket purchasing limits on its own primary ticket sales platform in an effort to expand its ticket resale division," Moran and Blumenthal wrote in a letter. "Citing examples of TradeDesk users moving up to several million tickets per year, the allegations of the harms to consumers made in this piece are serious and deserve immediate attention." The senators have given Rapino until Oct. 5 to respond to their inquiry, and a Ticketmaster spokesperson replied, claiming the article's implications are "categorically false," and that "We look forward to clarifying these misconceptions later this week." The representative further stressed that "Ticketmaster does not have, and has never had, any program or product that helps professional resellers gain an advantage to buy tickets ahead of fans. Period. We would never make anything like that, which would go against the very core of who we are and what we do."

Read the full story on the Variety website.

Want news like this delivered to your inbox weekly? Subscribe to the Access Weekly newsletter, your ticket to industry excellence.

Tags: Ticketmaster , Reselling , News