By Steve Holland and Jeff Mason
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order aimed at protecting fans from "exploitative ticket scalping" and reforming the U.S. live entertainment ticketing industry.
Trump signed the directive in the Oval Office, with singer Kid Rock standing next to him in a patriotic American flag-themed outfit. Kid Rock said ticket scalpers’ use of bots to buy large numbers of tickets at face value and then selling them for a profit is a big problem in the industry.
"I want the fans to have fair ticket prices," Kid Rock said, adding that legislation was eventually needed to cap ticket purchases.
The order directs Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi to ensure that ticket scalpers are in full compliance with the tax-collecting Internal Revenue Service and other applicable law, a White House fact sheet said.
It also orders the Federal Trade Commission to work with the U.S. attorney to ensure that competition laws are appropriately enforced in the concert and entertainment industry, according to the fact sheet.
The Justice Department and dozens of state attorneys general sued Live Nation Entertainment (NYSE:LYV) and its ticket-selling unit, Ticketmaster, last year for allegedly monopolizing markets across the live concert industry in ways that hurt artists and fans.
Live Nation Entertainment issued a statement on Monday in support of Trump’s order and thanked him for trying to address scalpers and bots.
"We support any meaningful resale reforms — including more enforcement of the BOTS act, caps on resale prices, and more," the firm said.
In January, U.S. senators assailed Live Nation Entertainment’s lack of transparency and inability to block bot purchases of tickets, in a hearing called after a major fiasco involving ticket sales for a Taylor Swift concert tour.
Ticketmaster, which has been unpopular with fans for years, drew fresh heat from U.S. lawmakers over how it handled ticket sales last fall for Swift’s "Eras" tour, her first in five years.
Experts say Ticketmaster commands more than a 70% market share of primary ticket services for major U.S. concert venues.
The fact sheet singled out bot sales in particular.
"Ticket scalpers use bots and other unfair means to acquire large quantities of face-value tickets, then re-sell them at an enormous markup on the secondary market, price-gouging consumers and depriving fans of the opportunity to see their favorite artists without incurring extraordinary expenses," it said.