Live Nation Entertainment has agreed to settle the federal government's antitrust lawsuit against it, ending a high-stakes legal confrontation that had threatened to dismantle the world's largest live entertainment company and force it to spin off its Ticketmaster ticketing unit.
The settlement was announced during a court hearing on Monday morning, according to the Guardian, arriving with some surprise just one week into the trial. The agreement resolves all remaining matters with the Department of Justice without any admission of wrongdoing by Live Nation, the company said in a statement released via PR Newswire.
Under the terms of the deal, Live Nation will cap ticketing service fees at 15% and open its owned and operated amphitheaters to all promoters, who will be permitted to decide how to distribute up to 50% of tickets. The company will also divest its 13 exclusive booking agreements with amphitheaters across the United States, though it will continue to operate those venues. Chief executive Michael Rapino framed the concessions as an enhancement of the concert experience rather than a defeat. "Today marks a major step in improving the concert experience for artists and fans throughout the United States," he said in a statement.
In ticketing, Ticketmaster will be required to provide both exclusive and non-exclusive ticketing proposals to all major concert venues, preserving the right of venues to seek their preferred contract structure while giving the government restrictions it sought to address competitive concerns. Venues will also be permitted to distribute a portion of tickets through rival primary ticketing platforms. "We have never relied on exclusivity to drive our ticketing business," Rapino said, "it has simply been the result of having the best products, services and people in the industry."
The settlement will also include an eight-year extension of the company's existing consent decree with the DOJ, incorporating retaliation and conditioning terms that Live Nation said were designed to provide venues with assurance against anticompetitive conduct.
There is no direct financial penalty payable to the federal government. However, the company has created a $280 million fund to address damages claims brought by states that participated in the lawsuit. The Guardian reported that Live Nation will pay roughly $200 million in damages to those states and that Ticketmaster will be required to open parts of its platform to rival ticketing companies. The settlement does not have universal support among the states involved. A bipartisan group of states has refused to sign the agreement, according to Politico, a development that signals the settlement may face further scrutiny before receiving final court approval. Live Nation said the proposed settlement will be reflected in a final proposed judgement submitted to the court.
The case had drawn intense public attention following the collapse of ticket sales for Taylor Swift's Eras Tour, which subjected fans to hours-long queues and steep prices and intensified scrutiny of Live Nation's acquisition of Ticketmaster. The DOJ filed suit arguing the company had built and maintained an illegal monopoly across the live entertainment industry, spanning concert venues, promotion, and ticketing. Live Nation had consistently maintained the allegations were without merit, and a portion of the original claims were dismissed by the court before the trial began.
The Wall Street Journal noted that the settlement spares the concerts-and-ticketing giant from the most severe outcome it faced: the forced breakup of its business. NBC News similarly reported that the company had succeeded in avoiding a Ticketmaster divestiture, the remedy that critics and several state attorneys general had most aggressively sought.
Shares in Live Nation trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker LYV.
