New lawsuit claims Ticketmaster and Live Nation overcharged concertgoers

Jeanene Popp, Luis Ponce and Jacob Roberts filed a class action lawsuit against Live Nation Entertainment Inc. and Ticketmaster LLC in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. The complaint alleges the companies abused their dominance over concert promotion and primary ticket sales to charge fans inflated fees at major U.S. venues for more than a decade.

The court certified the case, Popp, et al. v. Live Nation Entertainment Inc. and Ticketmaster LLC., as a nationwide class action covering ticket purchases since 2010.

Alleged anticompetitive practices

The lawsuit claims Live Nation and Ticketmaster hold monopoly power in two related markets: primary ticketing services for major concert venues and concert promotion services for those same venues. The suit defines a "major concert venue" as one of the top 500 U.S. concert venues by ticket sales as ranked by industry publication Pollstar in any year from 2010 onward.

The complaint alleges three anticompetitive practices:

  • Exclusive dealing. Live Nation and Ticketmaster allegedly signed long-term contracts requiring major venues to use Ticketmaster as their only ticketing provider, freezing rivals out of the country's most lucrative buildings.
  • Coercive tying arrangements. Venues that wanted to host Live Nation-promoted concerts reportedly had to also accept Ticketmaster as their exclusive ticketing platform.
  • Economic threats and coercion. The defendants allegedly pressured venues that considered working with rivals, discouraging them from looking elsewhere.

Together, these practices let the companies charge "supracompetitive fees," or fees higher than a competitive market would allow, the suit contends.

What the lawsuit seeks

The plaintiffs request two types of relief. The first is monetary damages covering the gap between fees class members actually paid and the lower fees they reportedly would have paid in a competitive market. The second is injunctive relief, a court order forcing Live Nation and Ticketmaster to abandon the targeted business practices.

Live Nation and Ticketmaster deny the allegations and any liability. The court has not ruled on the merits of the case.

Who qualifies for the class

Class members include anyone in the United States who bought a primary ticket directly from Ticketmaster or an affiliated Live Nation entity for a concert at a major venue (as defined by the Pollstar ranking) and paid primary ticketing fees at any point since 2010. A "primary ticket" is one a person buys from the original seller when tickets first go on sale and not a resale ticket from a secondary marketplace.

Buyers whose tickets fall under a binding arbitration agreement with Ticketmaster or Live Nation do not qualify for the class.

What this means for concert fans

Class members who do nothing stay in the lawsuit and share in any future settlement or jury award, but the court's ruling binds them and bars a separate lawsuit on the same claims. Those who want to preserve the right to sue independently must opt out by July 6, 2026.

Ticketmaster fee class action website: ticketmasterfeeclassaction.com
Settlement administrator's address: JND Legal Administration, P.O. Box 91126, Seattle, WA 98111

There is no settlement, no claims process and no money available at this time. The trial is set to begin July 6, 2027, at the federal courthouse in Los Angeles.