Live Nation must face some claims in a lawsuit brought by the Justice Department and several states accusing it of violating antitrust laws in the live events industry.
U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian on Wednesday greenlit for trial allegations that Live Nation has monopolized ticket sales to major concert venues and illegally ties the use of its amphitheaters to its promotion business. “A jury must decide whether the exclusive contracts are the product of coercion (as there’s some evidence for) or venue preference (as there’s some evidence for),” he wrote. “There is a genuine dispute of material fact as to whether Live Nation has used monopoly power to foreclose competition.”
Still, Live Nation won its bid to dismiss claims that it monopolized concert promotions and bookings. The decision narrows the scope of the trial, set to begin with jury selection in New York federal court on March 2.
Dan Wall, Live Nation’s executive vp corporate and regulatory affairs, said in a statement that there’s now “no possible basis for breaking up Live Nation and Ticketmaster.” He added, “The deficiencies we identified in the Government’s monopoly power and conduct claims have not gone away, and we continue to believe that we will prevail in the end.”
After the ruling was issued, the company’s stock plunged more than 6 percent after the market closed but has since mostly recovered.
The lawsuit brought by the Justice Department and 40 state attorneys general in 2024 accused the Ticketmaster parent of leveraging its unrivaled positions as the nation’s largest concert promoter, ticket seller and venue owner to undermine competition. It looks to break up Live Nation and Ticketmaster after competition enforcers passed on trying to block their 2010 merger. The government hopes to lower ticket prices by separating the two live events giants. Depending on how the case plays out, it could drastically slash the company’s sprawling footprint across all avenues of the live events industry.
More than 70 percent of Ticketmaster’s contracts have an exclusivity provision, with the company accounting for up to 86 percent of all tickets sold, according to court filings. Taken together, the judge said, the numbers indicate that upwards of 50 percent of the market is foreclosed from competing — a threshold typically believed to violate antitrust laws.
In the case, Live Nation has maintained that exclusive contracting is a normal practice and actually boosts competition because ticketers submit bids for such deals, with venues picking the most favorable of the bunch.
Among the arguments that the government has advanced is that Ticketmaster coerces venues by conditioning access to artists on picking the company as the ticketer for the event. If Ticketmaster wasn’t awarded the ticketing contract, Live Nation would divert concerts to competing venues in the area, venue executives testified.
