It has been six months since the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) approved Viagogo’s takeover of StubHub.
It was agreed that for the deal to go ahead, the latter had to sell off its international business, which was snapped up by a venture capital group – Digital Fuel LLC.
The CMA approved the deal in September last year, almost two years after the original $4.05bn (£2.94bn/€3.5bn) acquisition was agreed between resale giant Viagogo, and Stubhub’s former owner, eBay in November 2019.
FanFair Alliance, a campaign group that has often criticised the decision from the CMA to allow the sale to go ahead, has once again called out the decision.
A tweet from FanFair Alliance read: “6 months since the CMA allowed an obscure US-based investment company to buy StubHub – on the premise they would provide meaningful competition to Viagogo. Not really working out too well, is it?”
6 months since the @CMAgovUK allowed an obscure US-based investment company to buy https://t.co/pLYzdX7Iw4 – on the premise they would provide meaningful competition to https://t.co/QDsXDd956e. Not really working out too well, is it? https://t.co/bjEQ2I04E3 pic.twitter.com/prm5l7XIuv
— FanFair Alliance (@FanFairAlliance) February 15, 2022
Analytics show that Viagogo is still attracting the most traffic. In fact, StubHub is receiving less than 10% of the number of visitors that Viagogo is attracting. Traffic and engagement amounted to roughly 3.1m in the last three months for Viagogo and a measly 247.2k for StubHub.
FanFair Alliance added that the situation “will get even worse” and that “we’re already back to a monopoly”.
Fair Ticketing Alliance, a consumer and trade campaign, responded to the original tweet and said: “The bids to knock Viagogo off the top of Google would have to be colossal. It’s basically not happening.
“The burn rate is enormous, you could only compete if you had a huge amount of inventory so that your click throughs converted. Hence why we see spec sellers and fake listings.”
Image: Jordon Conner on Unsplash