As the Justice Department kicked off its antitrust trial against Live Nation on Tuesday, the specter of a possible settlement lurked around the proceedings, as did that of Taylor Swift.
The Justice Department and 40 state attorneys general brought a lawsuit against the company in 2024, accusing the company, which owns Ticketmaster, of using its positions as the nation’s largest concert promoter, ticket seller and venue owner to undermine competition. Since then, Live Nation unsuccessfully tried to dismiss the suit, which was filed under the Biden administration. But the sense has been that the company could reach a settlement with the DOJ now under Donald Trump.
This argument was bolstered as DOJ assistant attorney General Gail Slater stepped down in February, amid reports of large companies cozying up to the administration and going above her head to strike deals with senior DOJ members.
Still, a 12-person jury was selected Monday, and opening arguments went ahead in the Manhattan federal courthouse Tuesday morning, amid lingering questions about whether it could all be upended by a last-minute deal.
“This case is about power. The power of a monopolist to control competition,” said David Dahlquist, an attorney for the DOJ, adding that “Today the concert industry is broken.”
Before the trial began, Live Nation won its bid to narrow down the scope of the trial after U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian agreed to dismiss claims that the company had monopolized concert promotions and bookings. The company still has to defend itself against claims that it pressures venues to sign exclusive ticketing deals and makes artists use its concert promotion services to perform in Live Nation’s amphitheaters.
In his opening, Dahlquist outlined Live Nation as having a monopoly on that part of the industry (with DOJ estimates of 86 percent of primary concert ticketing at major concert venues and a large share of the amphitheater market) and using that power to force venues to use Live Nation as promoter and Ticketmaster as a ticket agent or face the retaliation of Live Nation pulling shows from their venues. John Abbamondi, former CEO of BSE Global, which owns the Barclays Center in Brooklyn and briefly left Ticketmaster for SeatGeek, is expected to testify to that effect later Tuesday.
Additionally, the DOJ alleges that Live Nation has blocked competition by buying related companies in the market and locking venues into multi-year exclusive contracts.
In turn, David Marriott, the attorney for Live Nation, who is painting the company as being “all about bringing joy to people’s lives” through live music, is pushing back on what he sees as the DOJ’s selective calculations of their market share, arguing that there is more competition than ever in the ticketing market, and that the company also does not work as the promoter for all big artists, notably not working as the promoter on Swift Eras Tour, among other artists.
Still, Swift continues to be a persistent issue for Live Nation, as the site outages and long waits on Ticketmaster while it sold tickets for the Eras Tour came up again during their trial. In their opening, the DOJ claimed that they have messaging from Live Nation saying the system is “held together by duct tape,” after the Swift ticketing issues.
Marriott acknowledged that “there was a problem,” during the Swift onsale, but that there is more context to the “duct tape” comment, and that no other company could have handled the rush for tickets, which marked the single largest onsale by an artist ever.
As for the retaliation against venues that don’t work with them, Marriott argued that the long-term, exclusive contracts work in the venue’s favor as they provide upfront cash and a superior ticketing experience.
“Saying you’re better is not a threat,” Marriott argued, getting in front of the expected testimony from Abbamondi, as well as a recorded phone call he had with Abbamondi about switching to SeatGeek.
Twenty-five of the states that are part of the DOJ suit are also seeking damages from Live Nation, alleging that Ticketmaster has been overcharging fans.
Because the somewhat complex antitrust case is being tried before a 12-person jury, each party took pains to lay out the process, and provide visual explainers, about how an artist works with promoters and others to book a tour, and who profits.
Witnesses on the docket include Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino, who is expected to testify this week, as well as other company executives, promoters, venue owners and competing services Fans are also going to be called in to testify on Live Nations’ behalf, as is Drake’s manager Adel Nur. Kid Rock is one of the artists expected to testify.
The remedy proposed by the DOJ is a break up of Live Nation and Ticketmaster, more than a decade after the merger had been approved in 2010. The government also hopes to lower ticket prices by separating the two entities.
Since the scope of the trial has been narrowed, Live Nation has viewed a breakup of the two companies unlikely, with Dan Wall, Live Nation’s executive vp corporate and regulatory affairs, saying at the time that there’s “no possible basis for breaking up Live Nation and Ticketmaster.” Wall is also expected to testify as part of the trial.
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