The Following is a statement by Steve Pociask, President of the American Consumer Institute, regarding a newly filed antitrust lawsuit against Ticketmaster and the Golden State Warriors: 

“The American Consumer Institute applauds the actions against Ticketmaster and the Golden State Warriors to stop ongoing attempts by Ticketmaster and some sports teams to end competitive reselling of event tickets by consumers. If the lawsuit filed by StubHub prevails, it will go a long way in ending the anti-free market and monopolistic practices of Ticketmaster that have long hurt consumers.

The Golden State Warriors are part of the NBA’s partnership with Ticketmaster and are coercing ticket resellers, through ticket cancellation threats, to resell tickets exclusively on NBATickets.com in an attempt to eliminate competition from alternative resale platforms.

These practices are meant to limit competition and hurt the consumer by limiting choice and creating higher prices. The official resale site of the Warriors, NBATickets.com, charges ticket buyers substantially higher fees than competing exchanges and allows the team to set a hidden price floor. These practices allow Ticketmaster and the Warriors to monopolize the ticket resale market. Because Ticketmaster is the dominant primary ticket seller, their attempts to leverage their near monopoly and control the competitive resell market are anti-consumer.

As a leading voice for consumers and free-market solutions, ACI applauds the legal effort to stand up against these monopolistic practices and put an end to these unfair consumer practices. ACI will continue to support these efforts by educating our members and pushing our message via social media.”

###

The American Consumer Institute Center for Citizen Research is a nonprofit educational and research organization.  For more information about ACI, visit www.theamericanconsumer.org, or follow us on Twitter @ConsumerPal.

Share: