The US has introduced a new law designed to deter ticket touts from reselling concert and event tickets at a profit via sites such as StubHub and Ticketmaster. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is tackling scalpers as part of the American Rescue Plan Act, which requires ticketing firms to report anyone making more than $600 annually on resales via a 1099-K form. This asks for information on “payment card and third party network transactions”. The new regulation came into effect at the start of the 2023 tax year.
The 1099-K form was previously only applicable to those making more than $20,000 on 200 or more transactions a year. “There are no changes to what counts as income or how tax is calculated”, said the IRS. The move is part of a wider global effort to clamp down on ticket scalping. Last year, Viagogo was found to have sold most festival tickets via three sellers taking £730,000 to £1.7m.
Brazil implemented new legislation in June to stamp out ticket touting after Taylor Swift announced the international leg of her Eras tour. The bill, which could land those reselling tickets for profit in jail for four years and/or facing penalties of up to 100 times the original ticket price, was introduced by Simone Marquetto, member of the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies for São Paulo.
The IRS has made scalping an increasing priority in recent years. In 2018, then-IRS Commissioner John Koskinen told Congress that if the agency had access to more transaction data from ticket sellers, agents could better catch people engaged in the practice. “At the moment, the IRS is trying to play catch up on the issue of ticket touting,” said Ryan Patel, a senior fellow at the Drucker School of Management at Claremont Graduate University.
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