By Judy Goodway and Kritika Lamba
March 9 (Reuters) – Live Nation Entertainment has reached a proposed settlement with the U.S. Justice Department in an antitrust case targeting its dominance of the live events industry, according to a court hearing on Monday.
At the same hearing, it was revealed that Live Nation is also in talks with state attorneys general to secure a broader, international settlement of related state-level antitrust claims.
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Shares of the California-based company are up about 6%.
Live Nation, Ticketmaster and the DOJ did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment.
The development threw the case into disarray in the middle of what was a week-long trial. New York and 38 other states in addition to Washington, DC also have claims against Life Nation.
A Washington, D.C. attorney moved to litigate on behalf of the states. The judge was considering the request Monday morning, or possibly halting the trial to allow the states to proceed on their own.
U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian questioned why the parties had not notified the court sooner of the settlement, which was signed Thursday. A DOJ attorney said she was not aware of the settlement because the trial was pending Friday.
“It shows absolute disrespect for the court, the jury, for this whole process, and it’s totally unacceptable,” he said.
Fans and politicians had stepped up calls to scrutinize Live Nation’s 2010 acquisition of Ticketmaster, after the company subjected Taylor Swift fans to hours-long online queues while charging high prices for tickets to her 2022 Eras tour.
The U.S. Department of Justice and more than two dozen states sued to break up Live Nation in May 2024, demanding the sale of Ticketmaster and accusing the companies of illegally raising concert ticket prices and hurting artists.
The lawsuit began last week after a judge in February denied Live Nation’s request to dismiss the lawsuit.
According to a Politico report, the agreement requires the concert giant to pay about $200 million in damages to participating countries and submit to sweeping structural reforms aimed at controlling its long-criticized controls on ticketing, venues and artist promotions.
“The recently announced settlement with the US Department of Justice fails to address the monopoly at the center of this case, and will benefit the Living Nation at the expense of consumers. We cannot agree,” said New York Attorney General Letitia James.
Under the settlement, Ticketmaster will be required to open up parts of its technology platform to competing ticketing companies, allowing third-party sellers such as SeatGeek and Eventbrite to list tickets directly through its system.
(Additional reporting by Katherine Jackson in Washington and Angela Christie in Bangalore; Editing by Sumana Nandy, Mrigank Daniwala and Krishna Chandra Elori)
