StubHub has accused Live Nation and the US National Independent Venue Association of spreading “false information” after last week’s claims that touts were speculatively selling tickets for the North American Oasis reunion shows before any tickets had been sold via official channels. Live Nation’s Ticketmaster has responded by claiming “StubHub is lying”.
“It is clear that Live Nation, Ticketmaster and NIVA have partnered to spread false information about ticket availability in an attempt to further their own policy agenda and create distrust in the secondary market”, StubHub’s Laura Dooley says in a bold statement.
She was responding to NIVA’s insistence that the availability of Oasis tickets on the resale market early last week, before the pre-sale on primary sites, demonstrated that new laws are required to ban the speculative selling of tickets by touts within the US.
However, it’s been claimed that some tickets for the Oasis shows were, in fact, on sale from official channels from the start of last week, which could have been the source for those tickets being listed on StubHub.
Not so, says Ticketmaster, which issued a statement to Digital Music News stating, “Oasis tickets were offered for sale on StubHub immediately after the North American dates and venues were announced, before any on-sale, and before anyone had rights to particular seats. Ticketmaster prohibits anyone from listing resale tickets before an official on-sale. StubHub and other resellers choose to look the other way”.
The campaign against speculative selling
NIVA tracked the listing of thousands of tickets for the Oasis US shows on StubHub and Vivid Seats early last week, even though tickets didn’t go on sale through primary ticketing platforms until Friday, with an official pre-sale on Thursday.
That meant, NIVA argued, these were speculative listings, where touts list tickets for sale that they haven’t actually secured yet, in the hope they will be able to access tickets down the line. The speculative selling of tickets in this way is often criticised, especially if the buyer is not aware that that’s what’s happening when they pay the tout.
A ban of speculative selling is among the new regulations of ticket touting being proposed in US Congress via a thing called the Fans First Act, which is supported by both NIVA and Live Nation.
Reaffirming Live Nation’s opposition to speculative selling last week, the company’s CEO Michael Rapino retweeted a link to NIVA’s statement and wrote, “We join Oasis and NIVA in calling on Congress to stop speculative ticketing which causes huge confusion for fans”.
Were last week’s Oasis ticket listings speculative?
StubHub insists it already prohibits speculative selling on its platform in the US, and argues that last week’s controversy around Oasis tickets has nothing to do with touts breaking the rules, and everything to do with the lack of transparency regarding how tickets are made available via the primary sites.
Although the official pre-sale of Oasis tickets in the US didn’t begin until Thursday, StubHub argues that promoters and venues often make tickets available via other channels too, but with less of a fanfare. That includes to season ticket holders at the stadiums where shows take place and, according to TicketNews, that’s exactly what happened at least one venue that is hosting an Oasis show.
It was forwarded an email from a Chicago Bears season ticket holder that outlined a pre-sale “open to the club’s season ticket members” for the Oasis show at the team’s Soldier Field stadium, which was available from last Monday, 30 Sep. TicketNews then adds, “it is almost certain that similar pre-sales were held at every venue that Oasis is performing at for their 2025 stadium tour”, not least because “every US stop on the tour is at a venue that is also home to an NFL franchise”.
Very much taking StubHub’s side, the TicketNews piece then says that NIVA “opted to take advantage of the lack of transparency around when and how tickets are distributed in its effort to score political points and headlines over the high profile tour”, with Rapino boosting the organisation’s efforts despite the fact Live Nation leadership “would have been well aware of the fact that tickets were absolutely available for purchase by some prior to the letter”.
Ticketmaster is the problem, says StubHub
Building on all that, the statement from Dooley at StubHub adds, “There is a lack of transparency around how tickets are allocated, sold and distributed in the primary ticket market, preventing consumers from understanding how the ticket industry works and allowing dominant players to manipulate the marketplace”.
“Tickets may appear on resale marketplaces before public on-sale because many industry stakeholders, such as season ticket holders, sponsors and professional resellers, receive early access”, she explains, before stating “this was the case with Oasis”.
“At StubHub, our top priority is getting fans into events”, she concludes. “We prohibit the sale of speculative tickets and call on Ticketmaster to open lines of communication, offer ticket verification services, and do their part to better protect fans”.
StubHub is lying, says Ticketmaster
Ticketmaster’s response begins “StubHub is lying”, adding that “the season ticket holder excuse is baseless”. For Oasis shows in Pasadena, Toronto, Mexico City and New Jersey, it states, “no one had season ticket holder rights to receive tickets”, and even in Chicago “no one had advance rights to the particular seats listed for sale on StubHub”.
Which means StubHub was, in fact, allowing the speculative sale of tickets to the Oasis shows, Ticketmaster insists, adding, “this continuing pattern of deception requires Congress to pass and enforce a comprehensive ban on speculative ticketing”.
Having sold out all their shows in the UK and North America, we now expect Oasis to announce Australian dates tomorrow. Let’s see what ticketing controversy happens there.