Ticket Economist

Lawrence White, an economist at NYU wrote a commentary on Huffington Post in support of ticket transferability and the State of New York’s recent renewal of a law, “that allows venues to sell non-transferable paperless tickets only if buyers have the option of a transferable alternative, including the right to resell their ticket above or below face value as they see fit…” The gist of White’s position …if you buy the ticket, you should own it, and be able to…

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Earlier this afternoon, a panel discussion at Ticket Summit in Las Vegas entitled, ‘The Merger” was held to discuss the Live Nation / Ticketmaster merger that was approved by the Justice Department earlier this year. The panelists included Jeff Kline of Veritix, Doug Lyons of Tickets.com, and Don Vaccaro of ticketnetwork. For ticket brokers, the timing of the panel discussion could not have been better as almost simultaneously, Live Nations stock price is being hammered by news of a revenue dip…

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New York City is an exceptionally vibrant market for secondary market ticket sales. In the U.S. the Big Apple is nearly head to head with Las Vegas in scalping activity and high resale prices.  It is no secret that New York has sought to curb ticket resale through various forms of legislation over the years. In June 2007 the states position changed when then Governor Eliot Spitzer opened ticket resale to the free market. The bill is presently extended through June…

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The recent allegations against Wiseguy Tickets represents a step forward for law enforcement in the illegal and unfair practice of hacking primary ticket seller websites to get the best tickets. Simultaneously, this case represents a step backward for ticket resellers.

At last weeks Ticket Summit in Las Vegas, the leaders StubHub, Ticket Network and Razor Gator each explained that resold ticket prices are dropping on increased supply. Don Vaccaro, CEO of Ticket Network stated that “average [resold] ticket prices were down 15%.” This story is consistent with StubHub’s statement that average ticket prices are down $20 to $140 from last year. Lower prices coupled with increase supply suggests that growth in the secondary market means better values for fans. It…

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This past week I had the opportunity to attend Ticket Summit in Las Vegas. I was prompted to attend the conference when I was invited to participate in a panel discussion on ticket pricing. Prior to being invited, I am embarrassed to admit I had only known of the National Association of Ticket Brokers (NATB). When I researched Ticket Summit, I quickly learned it was run by Ticket Network, a leading broker and provider of technology solutions to ticket brokers….

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