Live Nation Entertainment Inc (LYV) 2025 Q1 法說會逐字稿

Good afternoon. My name is Joe, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to Live Nation's First Quarter 2025 Earnings Call. I would now like to turn the call over to Ms. Amy Yong. Thank you, Ms. Yong, you may begin your conference.

午安.我叫喬，今天我將擔任您的會議主持人。現在，我歡迎大家參加 Live Nation 2025 年第一季財報電話會議。現在我想把電話轉給 Amy Yong 女士。謝謝您，楊女士，您可以開始您的會議了。

Good afternoon, and welcome to the Live Nation First Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call. Joining us today is our President and CEO, Michael Rapino and our President and CFO, Joe Berchtold.

下午好，歡迎參加 Live Nation 2025 年第一季財報電話會議。今天與我們一起出席的是我們的總裁兼執行長 Michael Rapino 和總裁兼財務長 Joe Berchtold。

We would like to remind you that this afternoon's call will contain certain forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ, including statements related to the company's anticipated financial performance, business prospects, new developments, and similar matters. Please refer to Live Nation's SEC filings, including the risk factors and cautionary statements included in the company's most recent filings on Forms 10-K, 10-Q, and 8-K, for a description of risks and uncertainties that could impact the actual results. Live Nation will also refer to some non-GAAP measures on this call. In accordance with the SEC Regulation G, Live Nation has provided definitions of these measures and a full reconciliation to the most comparable GAAP measures in our earnings release. The release reconciliation can be found under the financial information section on Live Nation's website.

我們想提醒您，今天下午的電話會議將包含某些前瞻性陳述，這些陳述受風險和不確定性的影響，可能導致實際結果有所不同，包括與公司預期財務業績、業務前景、新發展和類似事項有關的陳述。請參閱 Live Nation 向美國證券交易委員會 (SEC) 提交的文件，包括公司最近提交的 10-K、10-Q 和 8-K 表格中包含的風險因素和警示聲明，以了解可能影響實際結果的風險和不確定性。Live Nation 也將在本次電話會議上參考一些非 GAAP 指標。根據美國證券交易委員會 (SEC) 的 G 條例，Live Nation 在我們的收益報告中提供了這些指標的定義以及與最具可比性的 GAAP 指標的完整對帳。您可以在 Live Nation 網站的財務資訊部分找到發布對帳單。

With that, we will now take your questions. Operator?

現在我們將回答大家的提問。操作員？

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to ask a question, please press star, one, on your telephone keypad, and your confirmation tone will indicate your lines in the question queue. You may press star, two, if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. And our first question comes from the line of Brandon Ross with LightShed Partners. Please proceed.

謝謝。女士們、先生們，如果您想提問，請按電話鍵盤上的星號 1，確認音將指示您在問題佇列中的線路。如果您想從佇列中刪除您的問題，請按星號 2。對於使用揚聲器裝置的參與者，可能需要先拿起聽筒，然後按星號鍵。我們的第一個問題來自 LightShed Partners 的 Brandon Ross。請繼續。

Hey, guys. Thanks for taking the questions. I wanted to dig deeper on the Ticketmaster results. Was really surprised to see revenue and AOI down given the amount of stadium activity and really, the 2025 supply side in general. I see deferred is up a lot in the Q2 start, and so I assume part of this is timing related in international markets and O&O ,but what are some of the other factors that influence the results, and should we expect improvement for the rest of the year?

嘿，大家好。感謝您回答這些問題。我想更深入地了解 Ticketmaster 的結果。考慮到體育場活動的數量以及 2025 年的整體供應情況，看到收入和 AOI 下降確實令人驚訝。我看到遞延稅款在第二季初大幅增加，因此我認為部分原因在於國際市場和 O&O 的時間安排，但還有哪些其他因素會影響結果，我們是否應該期待今年剩餘時間會出現改善？

Hey Brandon, it's Joe. I'll start with that one. So for the TM, yeah, there are a couple of pieces, both the activity that was reported in the quarter, as well as the deferred. So for the activity that was reported in the quarter, what we had was more Live Nation concerts activity, less other promoters and less non-concerts activity. So more specifically, for the quarter, Live Nation concerts through Ticketmaster were up 12% year on year. Other promoters were down 2%. And then, overall, concerts were up 4%, but other categories, sports, arts, family were down 9%.

嘿，布蘭登，我是喬。我先從那一個開始。因此對於 TM 來說，是的，有幾個部分，包括本季度報告的活動以及遞延的活動。因此，就本季報告的活動而言，我們的 Live Nation 音樂會活動較多，其他推廣商活動較少，非音樂會活動較少。更具體地說，本季度透過 Ticketmaster 舉辦的 Live Nation 音樂會同比增長了 12%。其他發起人則下跌了 2%。總體而言，音樂會上漲了 4%，但其他類別、體育、藝術、家庭等則下降了 9%。

When we were doing our planning and talking a few months back on expectations for the quarter, at that point, we didn't have any reason to anticipate this lower level of activity in the other parts of the business. Everything that we've seen points to its supply, no demand issues. It's just less supply year on year. And when we were doing some of our forecasting, we were expecting consistent levels, and therefore, the growth in Live Nation would have carried through to higher growth.

幾個月前，當我們制定計劃並談論本季的預期時，我們沒有任何理由預期業務其他部分的活動水平會降低。我們所看到的一切都表明它存在供應問題，沒有需求問題。只是供應量逐年減少。當我們進行一些預測時，我們期望保持穩定的水平，因此 Live Nation 的成長將會延續到更高的成長。

Then on the deferred side, yeah, we have deferred for Ticketmaster up 13% for the quarter. If that deferred had all been recognized, revenue for the quarter would have been up. But overall, what we have is more deferred between international volume growing, which is substantially deferred through the promoter allocation, continuing to increase our operated venue portfolio, while the flip-side is, is the costs get incurred in Q1, the AOI for those tickets doesn't get recognized until the events take place, which will be largely in Q2 and Q3. The other couple of pieces of macro context is, is just what we're seeing is a bit later on sales timing, with more concerts activity in H2 than last year. So we're seeing those on sales and continued strength, particularly, as you noted, for April being up 22% globally through the first part, and we expect probably two-thirds of the Live Nation concert fan growth to be in the second half this year, in terms of when the events actually take place and that fan growth happens. So you're seeing a bit of just a little later timing of those on sales. And you've seen some huge on sales for Chris Brown, Lady Gaga and others this month.

然後在遞延方面，是的，本季我們為 Ticketmaster 遞延了 13% 的金額。如果所有遞延款項都得到確認，本季的收入就會增加。但總體而言，我們在國際票房成長方面擁有更多的延期，這透過發起人分配大幅推遲，繼續增加我們運營的場館組合，而另一方面，成本是在第一季度產生的，這些門票的 AOI 直到活動舉行時才會被確認，這將主要在第二季度和第三季度。另外一些宏觀背景是，我們看到的銷售時間稍晚一些，下半年的音樂會活動比去年更多。因此，我們看到銷售額和持續的強勁增長，特別是如您所說，4 月份上半年全球銷售額增長了 22%，我們預計 Live Nation 演唱會粉絲增長的三分之二將出現在今年下半年，就活動實際舉行和粉絲增長而言。因此，您會看到這些產品的銷售時間稍晚。本月，您將看到 Chris Brown、Lady Gaga 和其他藝人的銷量大幅成長。

And then finally, the one area that is also hitting Ticketmaster is FX this year. While FX has rebounded for a lot of markets, for Mexico and Latin America, it's still a headwind, and Ticketmaster took about 60% of that headwind in Q1, in terms of its portion of the overall company's headwind, and we project it to be kind of two-thirds of the headwinds in Q2. So it's going to have a little bit of a reported impact in the short term. As you said, all of this is in the context of massive growth in deferred revenue for concerts and good double-digit growth in deferred revenue for Ticketmaster. So we're still confident we'll get some good growth out of Ticketmaster for the year, but we didn't see it play through in Q1 as much as we expected.

最後，今年 Ticketmaster 也受到了關注的一個領域是 FX。雖然外匯在許多市場已經反彈，但對於墨西哥和拉丁美洲來說，這仍然是一個逆風，而 Ticketmaster 在第一季度承受了大約 60% 的逆風，就其在整個公司逆風中所佔的比例而言，我們預計它將佔第二季度逆風的三分之二。因此，短期內它會產生一些影響。正如您所說，所有這一切都是在音樂會遞延收入大幅增長以及 Ticketmaster 遞延收入實現兩位數良好增長的背景下發生的。因此，我們仍然相信 Ticketmaster 今年會取得良好的成長，但我們認為其在第一季的表現不如預期。

Got it. It sounds, from that answer, that you're not seeing as much headwinds from tariffs or other economic issues in the consumer yet. And you could correct me if I'm wrong, but wanted to get a sense of what the potential disruption is if there is a slowdown in the consumer? And I guess two legs to that. One is how much of the year, especially concerts, is already in the bag through your on sales and sponsorship, and then for the parts that are more real time, like amphitheaters, what can you do if you do see the consumer weaken to protect AOI?

知道了。從這個答案來看，您似乎還沒有看到關稅或其他經濟問題對消費者造成太大的阻力。如果我錯了，你可以糾正我，但你想了解如果消費放緩會造成什麼樣的潛在影響嗎？我想這是兩條腿。一是，一年中有多少活動，尤其是音樂會，已經透過銷售和贊助賺得盆滿缽滿，然後對於更實時的部分，比如露天劇場，如果您確實看到消費者減少以保護 AOI，您會怎麼做？

I'll start on demand, and then Joe can jump in. I mean, Brandon, on the concert side, and, you know, it's the question every CEO gets asked, and are you feeling the consumer pullback at all? We haven't felt it at all yet. So a lot of our stuff is on sale October, November, December, so that stuff would have already been to the system. The real number we look at is what have we done from April 1 to April 21st, the most relevant on sale period. We put a lot of shows on sale in the month of April. Chris Brown sold a million tickets this month; Mumford & Sons, 300, $uicideboy$, Lady Gaga sold out, up 18% year-over-year. So any data we have right now up until last week, whether it's a festival on sale or a new tour or a show that went on sale, complete sell-through and strong demand and beating last year's numbers. So we haven't seen a consumer pullback in any genre, club, theater, stadium, amphitheater. We haven't seen it at all happen yet. Two, sponsorship, we've got over 80% of our business contracted this year so far. We're up over last year. Again, because we deal on more longer-term relationships, we don't feel it. We don't have a weekly digital buy that can be canceled. Ours is the longer-term commitments. And we still see brands flocking and exploring, and we're attracting new brands all the time. So we've seen no sponsorship pullback yet. And as you said, the last thing that we really don't have enough data on yet would be the summer food and beverage and kind of on-site. We haven't seen anything. We had 11 amphitheaters played out so far. We had a festival on the weekend. We've had theaters and clubs. None of that yet has said that they're buying one less beer or they're consuming less on-site, on any consumer pullback. So we're actively working around our menu for the summer, pricing it right, making sure we got affordability built into it, and a wider menu to attract and build on. But so far, those three legs of the stool, the consumer demand, sponsorship and on-site, we haven't seen what others are seeing yet.

我會按要求開始，然後喬可以加入。我的意思是，布蘭登，從音樂會方面來說，你知道，這是每個 CEO 都會被問到的問題，你是否感覺到消費者的回落？我們還沒有感覺到任何變化。因此，我們的許多商品在十月、十一月、十二月都會出售，所以這些商品應該已經進入系統了。我們所關注的實際數字是 4 月 1 日至 4 月 21 日（最相關的銷售期）期間我們所做的事情。我們在四月賣了很多場演出。克里斯布朗本月售出了一百萬張門票； Mumford & Sons、300、$uicideboy$、Lady Gaga 的門票全部售罄，同比增長 18%。因此，截至上週我們掌握的任何數據，無論是正在銷售的音樂節、新的巡演還是正在銷售的演出，都已完全售罄，需求強勁，並且超過了去年的數字。因此，我們尚未看到任何類型的消費者減少，無論是俱樂部、劇院、體育場或露天劇場。我們還沒有看到它發生。第二，贊助，今年到目前為止，我們已經簽訂了80%以上的業務合約。我們比去年有所進步。再說，因為我們處理的是更長期的關係，所以我們感覺不到這一點。我們沒有可以取消的每週數位購買。我們的承諾是長期的。我們仍然看到品牌蜂擁而至、不斷探索，我們也一直在吸引新的品牌。所以我們還沒有看到贊助減少。正如您所說，我們目前確實缺乏足夠數據的最後一件事是夏季食品和飲料以及現場情況。我們什麼也沒看到。到目前為止，我們已經在 11 個露天劇場演出過。我們週末舉辦了一個節日。我們有劇院和俱樂部。但這些都沒有顯示，消費者減少購買啤酒的數量，或減少在店內消費。因此，我們正在積極制定夏季菜單，合理定價，確保菜單具有可負擔性，並提供更廣泛的菜單來吸引和發展顧客。但到目前為止，我們還沒有看到其他人所看到的東西，即消費者需求、贊助和現場這三條腿。

And just in terms of, Brandon, what we're doing is, is we're obviously tracking on a weekly and daily basis, all of those numbers, how are shows that are going on sale doing, what's the sell-through level, how are shows closing, what's happening on site? So we're watching all of that. Michael just gave you all the stats that are current, so we're continuing to watch that. We'll adjust as need be. And while we're generally growing, we've learned during COVID, we know how to take costs out, and if we need to take cost out of the business, we're fully capable and ready to do that. We don't think we're in that situation, but we have every lever at our disposal that we'll continue to monitor.

就布蘭登而言，我們正在做的事情是，我們顯然每周和每天都在跟踪所有這些數字，正在發售的展覽的銷售情況如何，銷售水平如何，展覽的結束情況如何，現場發生了什麼？所以我們正在關注這一切。邁克爾剛剛向你們提供了所有當前的統計數據，所以我們會繼續關注。我們將根據需要進行調整。雖然我們總體上正在成長，但我們在 COVID 期間學到了，我們知道如何降低成本，如果我們需要降低業務成本，我們完全有能力並準備好這樣做。我們不認為我們處於那種情況，但我們會繼續監控我們所掌握的所有手段。

Great. Thanks so much.

偉大的。非常感謝。

The next question comes from the line of David Karnovsky with J.P. Morgan. Please proceed.

下一個問題來自摩根大通的 David Karnovsky。請繼續。

Hey, thanks. Maybe I'll just stick with the shape of the year. You said concert margin flat for 2025. I think historically, you've kind of shied away from giving margin guide. Obviously, the Q1 result versus '24 helps, but maybe, can you speak to the rest of your expectations, especially kind of Q4 which has some moving parts, like it's a bigger quarter, I think, for OCESA, you have the advertising expense for next year. Just any kind of help there would be appreciated.

嘿，謝謝。也許我會堅持今年的形狀。您說 2025 年音樂會利潤率將持平。我認為從歷史上看，你有點迴避提供保證金指南。顯然，第一季的結果與 24 年的結果相比有所幫助，但也許，您可以談談您的其他預期，特別是第四季度，它有一些變動，例如它是一個更大的季度，我認為，對於 OCESA 來說，您有明年的廣告費用。任何形式的幫助都將受到感激。

Yeah, just, we're looking through all the pieces, and we're feeling good about how concerts is shaping up for the full year, I think, even better than we felt two or three months ago. While your profitability may not be as high in your biggest shows, you do get tremendous scale out of that, scale out of the organization, and we're driving a lot of volume and big growth in volume while continuing to manage our cost structure. So we think that this year, we'll be able to be at, around the same sort of margin level as we were at last year. It's not a target so much as we model it out, how it feels like we're going to end up.

是的，我們正在仔細研究所有細節，我們對全年音樂會的進展感到很滿意，我認為，甚至比兩三個月前的感覺還要好。雖然在大型展會上你的獲利能力可能沒有那麼高，但你確實可以從中獲得巨大的規模，擴大組織規模，而且我們在繼續管理成本結構的同時，推動了銷量的大幅增長。因此我們認為，今年我們的利潤率將能夠達到與去年大致相同的水平。這不是一個目標，而是我們模擬出來的，感覺就像我們最終會達到什麼結果。

A bit of a separate topic, but on your purchase of Hayashi, it seems like you've been circling a deal in Japan for a long time. Just wanted to see if you can give some background on the transaction. How should we think of this in terms of financial materiality, or strategic benefits for running tours in the APAC region? Thanks.

這是一個有點獨立的話題，但關於您購買 Hayashi 的事情，似乎您已經在日本規劃了很長時間的交易。只是想看看您是否可以提供一些有關該交易的背景資訊。我們應該如何從財務重要性或對在亞太地區開展旅遊活動的戰略利益的角度來看待這個問題？謝謝。

Yeah, it's been a target for a long time. It's an incredibly important market, one of the largest music markets in the world. It’s also, obviously, one of the toughest markets to operate from the outside. You've got to find local, establish partners to really scale your business, similar, like we did it in OCESA, in Latin America. Pacific Rim, we've been looking for this one to get done. There's three or four, pretty much three historic, large promoters in Japan that have had a strong control over the market for many years. We're thrilled that we were able to finally get our deal down with HIP. Kaori, who is a young executive, daughter of the original founder. We're really, really happy to be in business with her, and her established family and business. And it's already -- they met in terms of how we're planning to get avails, now we can promote directly in Japan and we're not selling off to other promoters who control the diaries of the venue. So a huge strategic deal for us to have one of the founding Japanese promoters as our partner now, and it’ll be continued building upon that, in terms of our venue, our festival, and bringing more shows there. So important step, and it’ll be another large AOI contributor to our overall business over time.

是的，這是我們長期以來的目標。這是一個極為重要的市場，也是世界上最大的音樂市場之一。顯然，這也是從外部運作最困難的市場之一。您必須找到當地合作夥伴來真正擴大您的業務，就像我們在拉丁美洲的 OCESA 所做的那樣。環太平洋，我們一直在尋找這部電影來完成。日本有三、四家，差不多是三家歷史悠久的大型推廣商，多年來一直牢牢控制著市場。我們非常高興最終能夠與 HIP 達成協議。Kaori 是一位年輕的主管，也是公司創辦人的女兒。我們真的非常高興能與她以及她已建立的家庭和事業開展業務。而且他們已經就我們計劃如何獲得收益進行了會面，現在我們可以直接在日本進行推廣，而不必將其出售給控制場地日程的其他推廣商。因此，對我們來說，與日本創始推廣機構之一合作是一筆巨大的策略交易，我們將在此基礎上繼續發展，包括場地、音樂節以及在那裡舉辦更多演出。這是非常重要的一步，隨著時間的推移，它將成為我們整體業務的另一個重要 AOI 貢獻者。

Thank you.

謝謝。

The next question comes from the line of Stephen Laszczyk with Goldman Sachs. Please proceed.

下一個問題來自高盛的 Stephen Laszczyk。請繼續。

Hey, guys. Thanks for taking the questions; two, if I could. In the press release, Joe, Michael, I think you mentioned the ramp in Venue Nation venues that expect to come online over the next year or so. Curious, if you’d maybe talk a little bit more about the pacing there and then, to the extent we could expect any incremental returns to flow through the P&L, AOI generation in the concert segment, for instance, how you would encourage us to think through that? And then maybe, secondly, just for Joe on regulatory. I think the latest update we got this past week is the DOJ states trying to bifurcate the case. Curious, if you could just update us on the latest there and how you're thinking about the case at this point? Thank you.

嘿，大家好。感謝您回答這些問題；如果可以的話，兩個。喬、邁克爾，我想你們在新聞稿中提到了 Venue Nation 場館的坡道預計將在未來一年左右投入使用。我很好奇，如果您能再多談一下當時的節奏，那麼我們可以預期任何增量回報都會流經損益表，例如音樂會部分的 AOI 生成，您會如何鼓勵我們思考這個問題？其次，也許只是針對喬的監管問題。我認為我們上週得到的最新消息是司法部正在試圖分拆此案。我很好奇，您能否向我們介紹那裡的最新消息以及您目前對這個案子的看法？謝謝。

Sure, just on the venues first. Out of the 20, I think the current view is we're going to have four of those open by the end of the year. So I would take what we've given you in magnitude and probably just, that's your clear run rate addition for next year, from shows opening this year. The others will all open up next year. So I would haven't modeled this out exactly, but I’d give a bit of benefit, but certainly not a full run rate, because it’ll take some time to get those shows booked for the full slate. So I think you’re going to get the full run rate going into '27, but next year will be a partial year. We'll guide you guys more as we get exact opening dates and a feel for how we're booking those venues.

當然，首先討論的是場地。在這 20 個中，我認為目前的觀點是，我們將在今年年底前開放其中 4 個。因此，我會接受我們給您的數量，這可能是您從今年開幕的展覽中明年獲得的明確運行率增加。其餘的將於明年全部開放。所以我不會對此進行精確的建模，但我會給出一些好處，但肯定不會給出完整的運行率，因為要讓這些節目預訂滿需要一些時間。因此我認為你將在 27 年獲得全部運行率，但明年將只是部分年份。當我們獲得確切的開放日期以及了解這些場地的預訂情況後，我們會為你們提供更多指導。

On the regulatory front, we're still mid process at this point. Continue to have an early March 2026 date for the timing of the court case. This is a period where you're spending these months, discovery, depositions, working through. I don't think we have anything material. No surprises, nothing unusual, that we just kind of continue along in this part of the process at the moment. And we're still hoping that when the timing is right, we'll have an opportunity to get into some real discussions with them. But that hasn't happened yet.

在監管方面，我們目前仍處於中期進程。繼續將 2026 年 3 月初作為開庭審理的時間。這段時間你要花幾個月的時間進行調查、取證和處理。我認為我們沒有任何實質的東西。沒有什麼意外，也沒有什麼不尋常的，我們現在只是繼續進行這一部分流程。我們仍然希望，時機成熟時，我們將有機會與他們進行一些真正的討論。但那還沒有發生。

Great. Thank you.

偉大的。謝謝。

The next question comes from the lineup Cameron Mansson-Perrone with Morgan Stanley. Please proceed.

下一個問題來自摩根士丹利的 Cameron Mansson-Perrone。請繼續。

Thanks. First, nice to see in the concert segment, a solid improvement in AOI per fan growth, meaningfully higher AOI on, I think, a similar fan volume, but any color on kind of what helped you deliver that improved per fan monetization at the concert segment this quarter?

謝謝。首先，很高興看到在演唱會部分，每個粉絲的 AOI 增長有了顯著的提高，我認為在粉絲數量相似的情況下，AOI 顯著提高，但是您能不能詳細說明一下是什麼幫助您在本季度的演唱會部分實現了每個粉絲貨幣化的提高？

Yeah. You know us, we don't tend to manage super tight on quarters with some of that. There’s so many moving pieces. I think, overall, what we're seeing this year, as I mentioned earlier on how it flows through to the margin, is because of the great scale of activity that we have, relative to our cost structure, we're seeing some growth in those overall numbers that we expect to hold for the full year. We don't yet have the on-site activity at the scale in our amphitheaters and festivals to have that impacted yet, but it's just a good mix so far, and some scale, and we expect that improved profitability to carry over the course of the year.

是的。你知道我們，我們不會在某些方面過於緊張。有太多活動部件。我認為，總體而言，正如我之前提到的，我們今年看到的情況是，由於我們的活動規模巨大，相對於我們的成本結構，我們看到總體數字有所增長，預計全年都會保持這種增長。我們的現場活動規模還沒有達到露天劇場和節日的規模，因此還未產生影響，但到目前為止，這仍是一種良好的組合，而且有一定的規模，我們預計盈利能力的提高將持續到今年年底。

Got it. There's obviously been a lot of venue mix, and change has kind of been particularly active it feels like the last couple years. As we look forward to '26, do you think that we've kind of reached a point where the fluctuations year-to-year in venue mix activity start to look more stable going forward, or any commentary on kind of where you see growth across kind of venue types occurring going forward or over the next several years?

知道了。顯然，場地組合已經有很多，而且感覺過去幾年的變化特別活躍。當我們展望 26 年時，您是否認為我們已經達到了這樣一個點，即場館組合活動的逐年波動在未來開始變得更加穩定，或者您對未來或未來幾年各種場館類型的增長有何評論？

No, I mean, on a macro level, we're thrilled that there's a new level of demand that's driving stadium shows. People, for years, used to say who's going to be the next Rolling Stones? And as you can see by the lineup this year, these are young artists, new artists and established artists that are able to now sell stadiums around the world. So I think just a testament to the demand and the consumer demand out there. So no, I think there’s things that, like, next year, there'll be the World Cup, that throws a lot of venue avails off in stadiums, so you might have more arena dates than stadiums. The Olympics last year in Europe throw off stadiums in Europe. So there's some things like that, that drive some of the avails.

不，我的意思是，從宏觀層面來看，我們很高興看到體育場演出的需求出現了新的成長。多年來，人們常常問誰會成為下一個滾石樂團？從今年的陣容可以看出，他們是年輕藝術家、新晉藝術家和成熟藝術家，他們的作品現在可以在世界各地的體育場館售罄。所以我認為這只是證明了需求和消費者的需求。所以不，我認為會有這樣的事情，比如，明年將舉辦世界杯，這將導致體育場館的大量空置，因此競技場的日期可能會比體育場的日期多。去年在歐洲舉辦的奧運讓歐洲的體育場館數量大為減少。所以有一些類似的事情會推動一些效益。

Our biggest challenge right now is finding avails in stadiums for next year and the year after on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights. That sometimes drives you into arenas if you can't get your avails. But overall, we just think it's a testament on a global basis. We just sold out a bunch of Coldplay dates in markets like India and Seoul. So we think, globally, stadiums demand is growing, will continue to grow, will continue to be a strong market for both festivals, arenas and stadiums. And the only fluctuation was just driven by some local economics in terms of other sports or other things taking up avails.

我們現在面臨的最大挑戰是找到明年和後年週四、週五和週六晚上體育場的空位。如果您無法獲得效用，這有時會驅使您進入競技場。但總的來說，我們只是認為這是一個全球性的證明。我們剛剛在印度和首爾等市場售出了多場酷玩樂團的演出門票。因此我們認為，全球範圍內對體育場館的需求正在增長，並將繼續增長，對於節日、競技場和體育場館來說，這將繼續是一個強勁的市場。唯一的波動只是受到當地經濟的影響，例如其他體育項目或其他事物佔據了資金。

Got it, very helpful. Thank you both.

明白了，非常有幫助。謝謝你們兩位。

The next question comes from the line of Peter Henderson with Bank of America. Please proceed.

下一個問題來自美國銀行的彼得‧亨德森。請繼續。

Great. Thank you for taking the question. So there's been a lot of discussion around like premium pricing and efforts to prevent leakage to scalpers and the secondary market. Just curious, how do you manage the proper pricing model, which perhaps in certain instances, doesn't mean immediate sellouts, while maintaining this perception of scarcity that perhaps helps to create a feeling of FOMO for fans? And also, where do you think you are in terms of the proper pricing model? Is there still a lot of room to fine tune that model? And finally, can you just provide some additional color on the 8% decline for the average get-in price across stadiums and how you're managing affordability initiatives with revenue optimization? Thank you.

偉大的。感謝您回答這個問題。因此，圍繞著溢價以及防止資金流向黃牛和二級市場等問題已經展開了大量討論。只是好奇，您如何管理適當的定價模型，在某些情況下，這並不意味著立即售罄，同時保持這種稀缺感，這可能有助於為粉絲創造一種 FOMO 的感覺？另外，您認為您的定價模型合理嗎？該模型是否還有很大的調整空間？最後，您能否就各體育場館平均入場費下降 8% 的原因提供一些補充信息，以及您如何通過收入優化來管理可負擔性計劃？謝謝。

I mean, I'll start on the macro. I mean, when you sit with the artist, the artist I always say, are the smartest brand managers out there. They're very focused on their fans, what they stand for, and making sure they're finding that fine line on affordability and paying for these fabulous shows, which are growing in costs all the time. These stadium and arena shows, you might have 50, 60 transport trucks on the road, 400 crew. You're incurring millions of dollars in weekly costs. You're bringing a Super Bowl to a stadium every night, and that artist is funding that. So they're trying to find that fine line always, in how do we maximize pricing to put a great show on? How do we make it affordable for the fan? And then the third is, how do we make sure we're just not giving it all to scalpers? So that's the premium pricing at the front of the house, a little bit of Robin Hood strategy. Let's price the front a little bit better, so the fan doesn't buy from a scalper, it buys direct. And then let's price the back end of the house a little cheaper. That's why you see some of the stadium prices come down. So how do you make sure you make it affordable throughout the house, but also, maximize that premium inventory that is probably going to get resold anyways? So it's an ongoing discussion. Every artist has a different philosophy on it. Every artist has a different size of show they want to produce. So you work with the artist, what type of show, how big of a cost is their weekly running cost, how much revenue they need to generate to fund the crew and the show, it’s pure startups. And then where’s that fine line with what others are charging and what's the market dynamic? So it's an ongoing process. Artists are smart as can be. They got accountants, lawyers. They got smart people all around them, so they're always looking at all the data like we are, and figuring out what's that fine, sweet line where I can maximize my dollars and still be affordable for my fan. And I would say, we're still in early innings of the industry becoming better at pricing, smarter at it, and the artists and managers and agents learning too. And different markets are at different levels, right? America is very advanced. Europe is very primitive still. Asia and South America are completely primitive. So you got what stage you're in in the life cycle, and rolling out pricing across other countries, and some of the learnings we have in America will take a few more years.

我的意思是，我將從宏觀開始。我的意思是，當你與藝術家坐在一起時，我總是說，藝術家是最聰明的品牌經理。他們非常關注他們的粉絲、他們的立場，並確保他們在可負擔性和支付這些精彩演出的費用之間找到平衡，而這些演出的成本一直在增長。這些體育場和競技場表演，路上可能有 50 到 60 輛運輸​​卡車，400 名工作人員。您每週要花費數百萬美元。你每晚都會在體育場舉辦一場超級盃比賽，而那位藝術家正在為此提供資金。所以他們總是試圖找到那條微妙的界限，即如何最大限度地降低價格以舉辦一場精彩的演出？我們如何讓粉絲們負擔得起？第三個問題是，我們要如何確保不把所有東西都交給黃牛？這是房子前面的溢價，有點像羅賓漢策略。讓我們把前端的價格定得好一點，這樣粉絲就不會從黃牛那裡購買，而是直接購買。然後讓我們把房子的後端定價得便宜一點。這就是為什麼你會看到一些體育場票價下降的原因。那麼，您如何確保整個房子的價格都實惠，同時又能最大限度地提高那些可能被轉售的優質庫存呢？所以這是一個持續的討論。每個藝術家對此都有不同的哲學。每個藝術家想要製作的演出規模都不同。所以你與藝術家合作，什麼類型的演出，他們每週的營運成本是多少，他們需要產生多少收入來資助團隊和演出，這純粹是新創公司。那麼，與其他人的收費標準相比，這個界線在哪裡？市場動態如何？所以這是一個持續的過程。藝術家都是極為聰明的。他們聘請了會計師和律師。他們周圍都是聰明人，所以他們總是像我們一樣查看所有數據，並找出最佳的界限，讓我能夠最大限度地利用我的資金，同時還能讓我的粉絲負擔得起。我想說的是，我們仍處於行業早期階段，定價方面需要改進，定價更加智能，藝術家、經理和經紀人也在學習。不同的市場有不同的層次，對嗎？美國非常先進。歐洲仍然非常原始。亞洲和南美洲完全是原始的。因此，您知道自己處於生命週期的哪個階段，並在其他國家推出定價，而我們在美國學到的一些知識還需要幾年的時間。

So we're still in what we would call it a global business. We're still in early innings of being really smart at pricing. How do you price the show on a Tuesday versus a Friday in LA versus Milan? What's the middle seat worth versus the back row? How do I maximize and sell it out? And as you said, a perfect show sells out as the doors close, right, for the first show. You want to have that idea that you priced it right and maximized the market. And it's somewhere between a science and an art right now, and we provide a lot of data for our artists’ team to think through what is the best model for them. But still lots of opportunity for the industry to continue to price it better, to sell through, as well as maximize some of the high, scarce commodity tickets.

所以我們仍然處於所謂的全球業務。我們在定價方面仍處於非常聰明的早期階段。在洛杉磯和米蘭，週二和週五的演出價格如何？中間座位與後排座位相比值多少錢？我該如何最大化並銷售它？正如你所說，一場完美的演出會在首場演出結束後售罄。您希望自己定價正確並且最大化市場。現在它處於科學和藝術之間的一種狀態，我們為藝術家團隊提供了大量數據，幫助他們思考什麼是最適合他們的模型。但該行業仍有許多機會繼續以更優惠的價格銷售，並最大限度地提高一些高價、稀缺商品的銷售量。

Thank you.

謝謝。

The next question comes from the line of Benjamin Soff with Deutsche Bank. Please proceed.

下一個問題來自德意志銀行的班傑明‧索夫。請繼續。

Yep. Good afternoon. Thanks for the question. I wanted to ask about the recent executive order directing the FTC to more rigorously enforce the BOTS Act. You've been vocal advocating for this in the past, so just curious what you think greater enforcement of BOTS would mean for your business. Thank you.

是的。午安.謝謝你的提問。我想詢問最近的行政命令，該命令指示聯邦貿易委員會更嚴格地執行《BOTS 法案》。您過去一直大聲倡導這一點，所以我很好奇您認為加強 BOTS 的執行對您的業務意味著什麼。謝謝。

Yeah, Ben, this is Joe. Combine both the executive order, the Ticket Act that's now underway, and some of the FTC requirements for all-in pricing. I think all of these changes are great. They are all moving towards creating more transparency for the fan and more scrutiny and regulation on the secondary market. The enforcement of the BOTS Act to make sure that we have actions being taken against bad actors that are cheating to get tickets and are doing so purely to make money for themselves, for no real benefit to the fans. Some of the things in the Ticket Act which deters speculative ticket selling and makes increased transparency in other ways take place. So we are strong supporters of all these. We think that there will continue to be more to be done even after these happen, but we're strong believers that content should control and benefit from their shows, their ticket sales, and we think that all of this is part of the tide that has turned and is doing that.

是的，本，這是喬。結合行政命令、目前正在實施的《票務法案》以及聯邦貿易委員會對全包定價的一些要求。我認為所有這些變化都很棒。他們都在努力為球迷創造更多的透明度，並對二級市場進行更多的審查和監管。BOTS 法案的執行是為了確保我們能夠對那些透過作弊手段獲取門票的不良行為者採取行動，這些行為純粹是為了自己賺錢，而對粉絲沒有任何真正的好處。《票務法案》中的一些內容可以阻止投機性售票行為，並在其他方面提高透明度。因此，我們堅決支持這一切。我們認為，即使在這些事情發生之後，我們仍將有更多的工作要做，但我們堅信內容應該控制他們的演出和門票銷售並從中受益，我們認為，所有這些都是潮流轉變的一部分，並且正在發生這樣的轉變。

Appreciate the color.

欣賞色彩。

The next question comes from the line of Kutgun Maral with Evercore ISI. Please proceed.

下一個問題來自 Evercore ISI 的 Kutgun Maral。請繼續。

Great. Thanks for taking the questions. I had a few on concerts. First, you provided a lot of helpful color in the release on various average ticket prices and indicated that you're implementing more price tiers across venues. I was hoping you could expand on this effort a little bit more, and maybe what the driving force behind this is in terms of, is this more of a precautionary effort, since Michael, to your earlier point, you're not seeing any signs of softness in demand, or is it something else completely?

偉大的。感謝您回答這些問題。我在音樂會上聽過一些。首先，您在發佈各種平均票價時提供了許多有用的信息，並表明您正在各個場館實施更多的價格等級。我希望您能進一步闡述這項努力，也許這背後的驅動力是什麼，這是否更多的是一種預防性努力，因為邁克爾，正如您之前所說，您沒有看到需求疲軟的任何跡象，還是完全是別的原因？

And then Joe, sorry to beat a dead horse and ask about margins at concerts, but it seems pretty notable to me that you expect margins to be consistent this year on a year-over-year basis, given the inherent volatility in the mix shift skewing back towards stadiums. You talked about volume and scale benefits, is there anything different in the way that we should think about operating leverage in that side of the business, or is there just a growing margin impact of Venue Nation? And I ask the Venue Nation bit because it kind of seems like you now expect Venue Nation’s fan count to be up double-digits this year versus the prior guide, implying high-single digits. So I'm not sure how much of an impact that could have, but any help would be appreciated. Thank you.

然後喬，很抱歉再問一個老生常談的問題，詢問音樂會的利潤率，但考慮到演出組合向體育場館傾斜的固有波動性，你預計今年的利潤率將與去年同期持平，這對我來說相當值得注意。您談到了數量和規模效益，我們在考慮該業務方面的經營槓桿時是否應該有不同的看法，或者僅僅是 Venue Nation 對利潤率的影響在不斷增長？我之所以詢問 Venue Nation 的情況，是因為看起來您現在預計今年 Venue Nation 的粉絲數量將比之前的預測增加兩位數，這意味著將達到較高的個位數。所以我不確定這會產生多大的影響，但如果能提供任何幫助我將不勝感激。謝謝。

So I'll take the second one first. Absolutely, all these pieces matter. Getting more fans into the Venue Nation buildings, where we're counting the beer money and the parking and the other pieces, also continuing to grow the per fan spend, all the various initiatives we have to make sure we're catering to every fan, from the traditional beer drinker to the person who wants non-alcoholic, to the premium person, doing everything we can to reduce friction and give everybody the best experience and extract as much money as possible from each person is going to continue to drive the economics of Venue Nation, and then that’ll naturally flow through to help the margins in the concert business. Long term, part of that is just a foot race between how fast we can grow Venue Nation and how fast other parts of the business grow, which is why we don't get into too much on long-term margins. But as we sit here now, we see what buildings are opening. As you said, we're now expecting double-digit growth in fans at our venues, which gives us some confidence we're going to be getting some good margin accretion from that. We're comfortable, we think margins are going to come in around the same as last year.

因此我先選擇第二個。當然，所有這些都很重要。吸引更多粉絲進入 Venue Nation 場館，我們正在計算啤酒費、停車費和其他費用，同時繼續增加每位粉絲的消費，我們採取各種舉措，確保滿足每一位粉絲的需求，從傳統的啤酒愛好者到想要無酒精飲料的人，再到高端人士，我們盡一切努力減少摩擦，為每個人提供最佳體驗，並從每個人身上榨取自然而然的利潤，我們盡一切努力減少 Venue 將繼續推動經濟效益的利潤。從長遠來看，這部分只是 Venue Nation 的成長速度與其他業務部分的成長速度之間的較量，這就是為什麼我們不會太在意長期利潤率。但當我們坐在這裡時，我們看到了哪些建築物正在開放。正如您所說，我們現在預計場館的觀眾數量將實現兩位數成長，這讓我們有信心從中獲得良好的利潤成長。我們感到很放心，我們認為利潤率將與去年大致相同。

I'd have to ask you to restate the pricing question. I missed that one.

我不得不請你重申定價問題。我錯過了那個。

Yeah. Sure. Sorry about that. The pricing question was more a matter of you talked about how you're implementing more price tiers across the venues, and I was just trying to understand the driving force behind that effort, in terms of, is it more kind of precautionary, just in case something -- we see greater softness in demand, or is there a different reason why you're trying to broaden the aperture of what pricing looks like across the venues? And I only ask because I'm trying to reconcile that effort with the commentary that you're not seeing any demand softness and just trying to understand that move a little bit better.

是的。當然。很抱歉。定價問題更多的是您談到如何在各個場館實施更多價格等級，我只是想了解這項努力背後的驅動力，是出於預防措施，以防萬一——我們看到需求更加疲軟，還是有其他原因促使您試圖擴大各個場館的定價範圍？我之所以問這個問題，是因為我想將這項努力與您沒有看到任何需求疲軟的評論相協調，只是想更好地理解這一舉動。

Yeah. No, we've been talking the pricing for a few years. And just going from where we were as an industry, we're very, very static. We had probably three price tiers for a tour, for the same cities for the same 40 dates. So Milwaukee, New York, it was $199, $126, and $69. Obviously, that doesn't make sense. New York on a Friday night, is a different market than Pittsburgh on a Tuesday. So we’ve made -- when I say increase in pricing, it's to do both things. It's always -- our fundamental first goal is to sell every seat, not to maximize gross and increase ticket prices. It's to sell every seat. Our business, as you know, is run by that. The more people in that building, parking and having a beer is better for us. So we're always looking to figure out, how do you make sure you're adding lower tier prices to sell-through? Also, generally, you never, ever sell back to front, you sell front to back. So as an industry, when we say 98% of our shows don't sell out, the tickets that don't sell are always the back to middle, never the front. So our job isn't to figure out how to sell the front better. That's already been done. It's probably price it more because there's higher demand for the better seats. Our real job is to figure out how do we sell the rest of the house? So when you're dealing with an artist and you're looking at the total gross for them, you want to be able to say, listen, we can go $39 tickets in the back, because the middle now is going to have two more tiers at $79, so we'll make up the same gross for you, but we'll make it more affordable for the back end of the house. And that's maybe different on a Saturday versus a Wednesday, and different in Pittsburgh versus Milan. So we're always just looking at all those variables now and saying, how do we best price the house to sell out completely and then maximize the gross. And similar, I've seen a lot of news around the buy now, pay later, Coachella, 60%. That's a similar story on payment, right? We've been looking at that for years. A payment plan is nothing new. It got way more noise, or news than it should. Festivals have had pay programs forever. I think EDC created it probably 10 years ago. So most festival goers have that similar, 40%, 50%, 60%. If you give a young consumer an option of spend $600 today or spread it over four months, of course, they're going to spread it over four months. It's probably a better program for them. So we're looking at all ways on how do you pay for it, how do you price it, and how do we continually sell out the house as the main goal.

是的。不，我們已經討論定價好幾年了。從我們這個產業的現況來看，我們非常非常停滯不前。同樣的城市、同樣的 40 天的行程，我們的旅遊價格大概有三個等級。因此，紐約密爾瓦基的價格分別為 199 美元、126 美元和 69 美元。顯然，這沒有意義。週五晚上的紐約與週二的匹茲堡是不同的市場。因此，當我說提高價格時，我們指的是同時提高兩件事。我們的根本首要目標始終是售出每張門票，而不是最大化票房收入並提高票價。就是把每個座位都賣出去。如您所知，我們的業務就是以此為基礎的。大樓裡的人越多，停車和喝啤酒對我們越好。因此，我們一直在尋找答案，如何確保將較低層級的價格添加到銷售中？此外，一般來說，你永遠不會從後往前賣，而是從前往後賣。因此，作為一個行業，當我們說 98% 的演出門票都沒有售罄時，賣不出去的票總是排在最後​​面，而不是前面。所以我們的工作不是要弄清楚如何更好地銷售前端。這已經完成了。價格可能會更高，因為對更好座位的需求更高。我們真正的工作是弄清楚如何出售房子的剩餘部分？因此，當您與藝術家打交道並查看他們的總票房收入時，您希望能夠說，聽著，我們可以在後面放 39 美元的票，因為中間現在將有兩個 79 美元的層級，所以我們會為您賺取相同的總收入，但我們會讓劇院後端的票價更實惠。週六和週三的情況可能有所不同，匹茲堡和米蘭的情況也可能有所不同。因此，我們現在總是在考慮所有這些變量，並說，我們怎麼能給房子定出最好的價格，才能讓房子完全售出，然後實現總收入的最大化。類似地，我看到很多關於「先買後付」和「科切拉音樂節」的新聞，佔 60%。關於付款，也有類似的故事，對嗎？我們已經關注這個問題很多年了。付款計劃並不是什麼新鮮事。它得到的噪音或新聞比應有的多得多。節日一直以來都有付費節目。我認為 EDC 大概在 10 年前就創建了它。所以大多數節慶參與者的比例都差不多，40%、50%、60%。如果你給一個年輕的消費者一個選擇，讓他們今天花 600 美元或分四個月花掉，當然，他們會分四個月花掉。對他們來說，這可能是一個更好的計劃。因此，我們正在研究各種方法，以了解如何支付、如何定價以及如何持續售出房屋作為主要目標。

Very helpful. Thank you both.

非常有幫助。謝謝你們兩位。

And the last question will come from the line of David Joyce with Seaport Research Partners. Please proceed.

最後一個問題來自 Seaport Research Partners 的 David Joyce。請繼續。

Thank you. I wanted to ask about any updates you can provide on the secondary ticketing markets. What have the volumes been trending like in this environment? And what are you seeing in some of these newer regions, such as in your OCESA markets? And technically, I was wondering if you could provide an update on what portion of the tickets have to stay within your ecosystem, and what agreements do you have with other third-parties to enable the broader secondary ticketing? And just wondering how that plays into the DOJ case. Thanks.

謝謝。我想詢問您能否提供有關二級票務市場的任何最新消息。在這種環境下，交易量趨勢如何？您在一些較新的地區（例如 OCESA 市場）看到了什麼？從技術角度來說，我想知道您是否可以提供最新消息，說明哪些部分的門票必須保留在您的生態系統內，以及您與其他第三方達成了哪些協議以實現更廣泛的二級票務？我只是想知道這對司法部案件有何影響。謝謝。

Sorry, David. I'm not sure I track the last part. We don't have anything where tickets would go off of our platform and directly into secondary. That doesn't exist. So that's not part of our business model, nor is it part of what we or any of the artists are doing these days. In terms of secondary market, we've talked for a long time. We consider this to be a feature, as opposed to a standalone business. It's very different between sports and concerts. It's part of the sports distribution channel, selling season tickets that then get broken down into individual games by teams, just as they're selling to other fans. A lot of brokers buy those tickets.

對不起，大衛。我不確定我是否追蹤了最後一部分。我們沒有任何措施可以讓票離開我們的平台並直接進入二級平台。那不存在。所以這不是我們的商業模式的一部分，也不是我們或任何藝術家目前正在做的事情的一部分。關於二級市場，我們已經談很久了。我們認為這是一個功能，而不是一個獨立的業務。體育運動和音樂會有很大不同。它是體育分銷管道的一部分，出售季票，然後按球隊分成單場比賽，就像賣給其他球迷一樣。很多經紀人購買這些門票。

But for us, it's a low-teens percentage of our GTV over the course of the year. We'll continue to offer it. We'll continue to advocate for reforms to make the industry as safe and positive experience for fans as possible, and we don't see this as a growth driver. We've talked a lot in concerts. We'd love to see it decline, because it means we're doing a better job working with the artists, pricing their tickets appropriately. So I don't think there's any real change in it from our perspective.

但對我們來說，這只占我們全年 GTV 的百分之十幾。我們將繼續提供此服務。我們將繼續倡導改革，盡可能為球迷提供安全和積極的行業體驗，我們不認為這是成長動力。我們在音樂會上聊了很多。我們很高興看到它下降，因為這意味著我們可以更好地與藝術家合作，並為他們的門票定價。所以從我們的角度來看，我認為它不會有任何真正的改變。

All right. Thank you.

好的。謝謝。

This concludes the question-and-answer session. I'll turn the call back to Michael Rapino for closing remarks.

問答環節到此結束。我將把電話轉回給邁克爾·拉皮諾 (Michael Rapino) 做最後發言。

Thank you, everybody. Appreciate your support and have a great summer, and we'll talk to you in the middle of the summer.

謝謝大家。感謝您的支持並祝您度過一個愉快的夏天，我們將在夏季中旬與您交談。

This concludes today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Enjoy the rest of your day.

今天的會議到此結束。現在您可以斷開線路。享受剩餘的一天。