{"id":2848,"date":"2025-12-17T11:42:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-17T11:42:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/?p=2848"},"modified":"2025-12-17T11:42:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-17T11:42:07","slug":"competitive-concerns-in-the-ticket-resale-market","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/2025\/12\/17\/competitive-concerns-in-the-ticket-resale-market\/","title":{"rendered":"Competitive concerns in the ticket resale market"},"content":{"rendered":"

The cost and availability of concert tickets for major tours \u2013 from Oasis to Taylor Swift \u2013 have been making the news in recent years. Dr Joe Bromfield from the School of Management at the University of Bath explores what\u2019s behind these headlines. <\/em><\/p>\n

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) announced a raft of investigations<\/a> into various markets, including secondary ticketing (the ticket resale market) on 18 November 2025. The next day, a UK government press release announced new measures preventing the resale of tickets above face value<\/a>. The timing and messaging of these press releases implies a coordinated effort on the part of authorities \u2013 showing that they are not happy with the current state of the market.<\/p>\n

What are the CMA\u2019s concerns about the ticketing market?<\/h2>\n

Ticketing came to public attention in 2024 following\u00a0 headline-grabbing concerns<\/a> about the pricing practices of Ticketmaster in relation to the reunion tour of British band Oasis. Investigating that case, the CMA expressed concerns about the lack of transparency and the use of dynamic pricing<\/a>. In short, equivalent tickets were being sold at different prices and customers experienced higher-than-expected charges at the end of the checkout process.<\/p>\n

Following the CMA\u2019s investigation<\/a>, Ticketmaster committed to warning customers where a tiered pricing system would be used, to provide updates during online queues, and refrain from using misleading ticket labels (giving the impression that tickets are distinct when they are not).<\/p>\n

Going forward, these actions will naturally benefit consumers in primary ticketing (where tickets are bought directly from the venue or an official platform such as Ticketmaster or See Tickets). However, the lasting impact of the case is in the attention it has drawn to ticketing more broadly \u2013 leading the CMA to investigate further. The government has noted the public\u2019s response to the Oasis case and has decided to act.<\/p>\n

2025 has been a busy year for the CMA. Changes in legislation mean that the regulator is empowered to pursue cases with greater conviction. The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024<\/a> (DMCC) brought about several changes that came into effect on 1 January 2025, including revisions to merger thresholds (guidelines regarding the scale and type of mergers that CMA will review) and a renewed focus on digital markets. The former includes the introduction of a new test to help the regulator avert so-called \u2018killer acquisitions\u2019 (where powerful companies acquire nascent firms to prevent future competition). The latter was guided by the UK Government\u2019s Strategic Steer of May 2025<\/a>, and the DMCC provides the regulator with the statutory powers it needs to make a difference.<\/p>\n

The consumer enforcement cases that were announced on 18 November follow on from one of the most significant changes brought about by the DMCC: the creation of direct consumer protection enforcement powers<\/a>. The CMA can now determine whether consumer protection laws have been violated without going through the legal system, greatly expediting and simplifying the process. It can impose significant fines for infractions, and it has a mandate to require businesses to compensate consumers who have been affected by unfair practices, including \u2018subscription traps\u2019, falsified reviews and \u2018drip pricing\u2019.<\/p>\n

A \u2018subscription trap<\/a>\u2019 is where customers are committed to a recurring payment that is difficult to cancel. Common points of entrapment are at the point of automatic renewal and with the rollover of services following a free trial. While active consumers might be savvy enough to cancel before the renewal date, passive consumers often find themselves locked into the purchase of a product\/service that either has an elevated price or that they may no longer need.<\/p>\n

Several misleading actions fall under the umbrella of falsified reviews. These include fake and misleading reviews (for example only publishing positive submissions), as well as instances where parties fail to disclose incentives they have paid\/received when promoting products. This is not a new phenomenon \u2013 social media personalities have been under the microscope for such actions in the past<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2018Drip pricing\u2019 involves showing an initial price to customers, only for further charges to be added before the transaction is concluded. It is a process many of us are familiar with: you are enticed by an advertised price, only to discover that there are additional fees for versions of the product beyond its most basic form. This kind of pricing is common in the airline industry<\/a>, where customers are offered various add-ons before they complete their purchase. In instances where the additional charges are optional (as with most airlines), regulators may be less concerned. But drip pricing represents a serious issue where the subsequent charges are required to complete the purchase.<\/p>\n

Indeed, this practice is a key concern in the secondary ticketing market. The CMA announced that secondary ticketin\u00adg sites StubHub and Viagogo are being investigated because add-ons, like booking fees, are not made apparent early in the ticket-buying process. Ticketing is by no means the only market under consideration for this reason \u2013 the CMA are also exploring whether AA and BSM Driving School make their booking fees clear in the market for driving instruction.<\/p>\n

Investigations have only just begun, but the most likely course of action is that StubHub and Viagogo will commit to earlier disclosure of the full nature of their charges. This, and the other investigations initiated in November 2025, will, at least, provide a strong indication of the extent to which the CMA can exercise its expanded powers under the DMCC.<\/p>\n

What might be the consequences of the government\u2019s decision to prevent the profitable resale of tickets?<\/h2>\n

Conceptually, the intervention represents a maximum price restriction (otherwise known as a price ceiling<\/a>). Specifically, the decision means that secondary sellers can only charge the face value of the ticket. The result of this binding price ceiling will be a shortage of tickets (excess demand in the market). In other words, at the enforced lower price, there are more parties willing to buy the product than those willing to sell it. This is the exact reason why (prior to the intervention) the price of secondary tickets was high: demand outstrips supply, and prices rise as a result. With a ceiling in place, this cannot happen.<\/p>\n

It has been suggested that the move will prevent customers being \u2018ripped off\u2019 and that the price of resale tickets will be \u00a337 cheaper on average<\/a>. With the opportunity for arbitrage removed, in theory, supply in resale markets should come from genuine fans who are selling tickets due to unforeseen circumstances. The role of the \u2018ticket tout\u2019 \u2013 those who mass-purchase tickets to sell on \u2013 will theoretically be eliminated. All of this sounds positive, but we can cite at least three possible adverse effects of the policy.<\/p>\n

First, the intervention creates a monitoring burden. The legislation imposes a legal duty on resale platforms to monitor and enforce the face-value price cap. If done properly, this will come at great cost to platforms like StubHub. What\u2019s more, companies may no longer view the UK as a profitable market, leading to their exit. There will also be a regulatory burden on authorities, who will need to oversee the process and enforce penalties when the platforms do not uphold the rules. The CMA will need to avert any attempts to circumvent the price ceiling too, for example via the use of additional fees.<\/p>\n

Second, the decrease in activity in the secondary market is likely to be coupled with an uptick in the primary market. The intervention means that ticket touts, who currently make up a portion of demand, will theoretically cease to do so, but true fans will be motivated buy more tickets in the primary market. This will create stronger incentives for primary ticketing firms to use dynamic pricing more extensively, to the detriment of consumers.<\/p>\n

Moreover, dynamic pricing is generally easier to achieve given recent developments in artificial intelligence. Pricing algorithms are more sophisticated than ever, and algorithmic collusion<\/a> \u2013 whereby pricing algorithms coordinate without human intervention \u2013 is a growing concern. As a result, while the government\u2019s decision will decrease prices in the secondary market, attention must be paid to the primary market to ensure that face value prices do not rise.<\/p>\n

Third and most importantly, the intervention makes it extremely likely that the resale of tickets will migrate away from platforms like StubHub and towards the black market. It is known that some customers are willing to pay more than face value for tickets, as evidenced by the prosperity of the secondary market before the government\u2019s action. The black market is likely to provide an avenue to relieve the pressure built up by excess demand. Indeed, this was the argument put forward by the ticketing companies when the investigations were announced, with a StubHub spokesperson suggesting: \u201cWhen a regulated market becomes a black market, only bad things happen for consumers\u201d.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Those \u2018bad things\u2019 relate to the fact that black markets are, by their nature, unregulated. This means that they offer no consumer protection and receive no regulatory oversight. Ultimately, the government intends to stop the exploitation of consumers, but their intervention may just make it easier \u2013 by moving the exploitation beyond regulatory control.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

All articles posted on this blog give the views of the author(s), and not the position of the IPR, nor of the University of Bath.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The cost and availability of concert tickets for major tours \u2013 from Oasis to Taylor Swift \u2013 have been making the news in recent years. Dr Joe Bromfield from the School of Management at the University of Bath explores what\u2019s...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2041,"featured_media":2849,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[150,108,112,132],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ai","category-culture-and-policy","category-economics","category-law"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/115\/2025\/12\/Blog-Images-2.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2041"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2848"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2848\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}