Live Nation told a New York federal court there's no need for a trial in the antitrust case from the U.S. Department of Justice and a contingent of states because enforcers have not shown that it has monopoly power over any live entertainment market or that it hurt competition.

Live Nation said in a redacted version of a summary judgment motion filed on Tuesday that enforcers have not done enough to back their claims accusing the company of systematically corrupting competition across "virtually every aspect of the live music ecosystem" over a 15-year period.

"Strong words," the motion said. "If there was a lick of truth to them, one would expect plaintiffs to now have mountains of evidence demonstrating monopoly power and the anticompetitive effects of Live Nation's conduct. And yet, after an 18-month investigation and a year of discovery, plaintiffs have barely a molehill."

The DOJ and a contingent of 40 state-level enforcers accuse Live Nation of violating antitrust law over its alleged efforts to control the live music supply chain, from ticketing to promotion to venue operations. The case targets exclusive promotion deals and long-term ticketing contracts, along with alleged threats of retaliation against rivals and concert venues following Live Nation's 2010 purchase of ticketing giant Ticketmaster.

The summary judgment motion, initially filed under seal on Nov. 11, said enforcers accuse Live Nation of having a monopoly over six separate markets. But the alleged markets are all "gerrymandered in obvious and legally indefensible ways" to suggest the company has a dominant share.

They did this largely by limiting the markets to a subset of the nation's larger concert venues, the motion said, because if they included all major venues and artists, Live Nation and Ticketmaster's market shares would be too low to infer monopoly power.

"These made-for-litigation markets plainly do not encompass 'the area of effective competition' that the law requires," the motion said, citing the U.S. Supreme Court's 2018 Ohio v. Amex decision.

One of the markets centers on services provided to "large amphitheaters" with capacities of 8,000 or more, yet the motion said artists and promoters routinely substitute arenas and other venues for large amphitheaters.

The other markets focus on various services provided to "major concert venues," which the motion said only includes amphitheaters and arenas with a capacity of 8,000 or more that host 10 or more concerts a year. This excludes stadiums, smaller amphitheaters and large theaters that could all serve as reasonable substitutes, the motion said.

As an example, the motion said the government's own expert calculated that Ticketmaster's market share in primary ticketing services drops from 86% to 49% when stadiums are included in the relevant market.

The motion said there is also no direct evidence of any anticompetitive effects from the alleged conduct. The case accuses Ticketmaster of forcing venues into exclusive ticketing contracts when they would prefer to use multiple ticketing platforms. But after thousands of hours of deposition testimony and millions of pages of documents, the motion said that theory "turns out not to be even arguably true."

"To the contrary, every venue witness has testified that they seek and prefer exclusive ticketing contracts," the motion said. "And there is no competent evidence that exclusive contracting allows Ticketmaster to extract supracompetitive prices from venues, let alone by excluding competition from rivals."

The same is true of claims that Ticketmaster wins business by threatening to divert Live Nation-promoted concerts away from venues that choose a competing ticketing service, the motion said. Just three venue witnesses supported this claim, the motion said, and only one in the last five years.

"To put that in context, Ticketmaster has negotiated thousands of ticketing contracts with major concert venues over the course of the relevant time period," the motion said. "Three out of thousands could not possibly prove the market-wide anticompetitive effects required for a monopolization claim."

Discovery has also disproven claims that Live Nation uses its portfolio of amphitheaters to coerce artists into using its concert promotion services for other portions of their tours, according to motion. Live Nation noted that enforcers have deposed only a single artist in the entire litigation.

"Conduct is exclusionary within the meaning of Section 2 [of the Sherman Act] only if it harms consumer welfare, most commonly by raising prices, lowering output, or reducing quality," the motion said. "There is no evidence of that in the record."

U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian refused to pare back the claims in March, after finding that the state enforcers have standing to seek damages for "supracompetitive prices" allegedly paid by concertgoers as a result of the conduct. The ruling also preserved claims that artists have been forced to use Live Nation's promotion services.

Judge Subramanian previously refused Live Nation's bid to transfer the case to the District of Columbia, where a federal court oversaw a settlement clearing the Ticketmaster purchase.

The claims are similar to those in a proposed class action from consumers that was brought before the government case, where the U.S. Supreme Court refused last month to clarify issues surrounding Live Nation's failed bid to send the case to arbitration. That case is pending in California federal court.

The Federal Trade Commission and a group of states also has a case pending in California federal court accusing Live Nation and Ticketmaster of deceiving consumers and artists by not disclosing fees and by helping brokers buy and resell millions of dollars' worth of tickets at a substantial markup.

Representatives for the DOJ and Live Nation declined to comment on Wednesday.

The government is represented by Bonny Sweeney, Arianna Markel and Matthew Huppert of the U.S. Department of Justice's Antitrust Division.

The states are represented by their respective attorneys general, including Adam Gitlin of the Washington, D.C., Office of the Attorney General.

Live Nation and Ticketmaster are represented by Alfred Pfeiffer, Timothy O'Mara, Jennifer Giordano, Andrew Gass, Kelly Fayne, Lindsey Champlin, David Marriott and Robin Gushman of Latham & Watkins LLP, and Lauren Moskowitz, Jesse Weiss and Nicole Peles of Cravath Swaine & Moore LLP.

The case is U.S. et al. v. Live Nation et al., case number 1:24-cv-03973, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.