A U.S. Senate antitrust panel will hold a hearing on the lack of competition in the ticketing industry following problems with Ticketmaster’s handling of Taylor Swift ticket sales last week, panel chair Sen. Amy Klobuchar said Tuesday. said
Senators Klobuchar and Mike Lee, the top Republican on the committee, did not provide a date or witness list for the hearing.
“The high fees, site disruptions and cancellations experienced by customers show how Ticketmaster’s dominant market position means the company faces no pressure to continuously innovate and improve,” Klobuchar said. will have.” “We will be hearing about how consolidation in the live entertainment and ticketing industry hurts customers and artists alike.”
Ticketmaster denied any anti-competitive conduct in a statement and said it remained subject to a consent decree with the Department of Justice after the 2010 merger, adding that there were “systemic violations of the consent decree.” There is no evidence.”
“Ticketmaster has a significant share of the primary ticketing services market due to the large gap between the quality of the Ticketmaster system and the next best primary ticketing system,” the company said.
Ticketmaster previously blamed advance problems for Swift’s Eras tour, the pop superstar’s first in five years, on unprecedented demand and efforts to keep out bots run by ticket scalpers. .
For her part, Swift said on Friday that it was “frustrating” for her to see fans struggle to get tickets and was assured that Ticketmaster could handle the high demand.
Klobuchar was one of three lawmakers who argued in a letter Monday that Ticketmaster and owner LiveNation Entertainment, the event ticketing giant that recently sold Swift concert tickets, should be broken up by the Justice Department. should if any malpractice is found in it. An ongoing investigation.
The DOJ has proven in recent years to be more willing to file antitrust cases against big companies — including one pending against Google in December 2020 — and to fight mergers… Reuters