The investors filed the lawsuit in 2023, claiming that they had been misled on the extent of Live Nation’s legal vulnerability tied to allegedly anticompetitive business operations.
Last Friday (March 21), lawyers on both sides informed the court that the $20m deal represented a “fair, reasonable, and adequate” resolution to the case.
The plaintiffs’ lawyers said they agreed to settle the case because of the “substantial financial benefit” the deal provides while also citing the “significant risks and costs of continued litigation and trial”.
Live Nation said that the deal removes the “uncertainty, burden, and expense of further protracted litigation.”
The investors’ lawsuit accused Live Nation of lying to them about conduct related to charging inflated fees and bundling services.
It also accused the company of retaliating against venues that chose a ticketing service provider that was not Ticketmaster, which merged with Live Nation in 2010.
Following the filing of the investors’ lawsuit, the United States’ Department of Justice then also filed an antitrust lawsuit last year which seeks to end the company’s dominance over the live events industry and break up its relationship with Ticketmaster.
Ticketmaster currently has an approximate 70 per cent share of the ticketing market while Live Nation has amassed a 60 per cent share of the concert promotion market and has exclusive contracts with about 70 per cent of venues in the US, according to the University of Oxford Faculty of Law.
Last year, shortly before the Department of Just filed its lawsuit, the court denied Live Nation’s attempt to dismiss the case.
The complaint accused Live Nation and Ticketmaster of unlawfully maintaining monopolies in concert promotion and primary ticketing markets, while engaging in other exclusionary tactics.