It’s always interesting when antitrust types bemoan what they imagine is a “monopoly.” Applied to Live Nation, what became the latter was founded in 1996. That the DOJ had no interest in it then is a statement of the obvious. The Justice Department only discovers what it deems “monopoly,” but that most sentient beings cheer as wildly successful, well after the fact.

Applied to Live Nation, assuming it’s “just so entrenched” as the ankle biters at the DOJ presume, that’s logically because the marketplace in which it operates, and thrives, was plainly in need of what Live Nation became. Better yet, those atop Live Nation did what entrepreneurs do whereby they led the marketplace to what Live Nation has become, among other things a concert promoter, artist manager, venue owner, ticket seller, and reseller.

In other words, Live Nation’s success in the here and now is a function of its executives having successfully anticipated a future of music that was wildly opaque, it having subsequently completed intrepid acquisitions based on its speculation about an uncertain future, only to be proven not just right, but resoundingly so.

Read the post on Real Clear Markets