The ticketing giant that stole the show from Oasis

One big succession plan to start: Schroders plans to appoint chief financial officer Richard Oldfield as its next chief executive, according to people familiar with the matter, tasking the former Big Four accountant with restoring the fortunes of one of the UK’s best-known asset managers.

In today’s newsletter:

• Ticketmaster comes under fire (again)

• CVC’s earnings boost private equity spirits

• Winners of the Verizon-Frontier mega-deal

Ticketmaster’s back in the regulatory crossfire

Ticketmaster just can’t keep itself out of the spotlight.

The world’s biggest seller of music and sporting tickets is being investigated by the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority after Oasis fans were confronted with concert tickets hundreds of pounds more expensive than what they had anticipated.

Welcome to “dynamic pricing”, the practice of adjusting prices based on changing demand. And for the first reunion in 16 years of longtime feuding brothers Noel and Liam Gallagher, there was plenty of it.

The regulatory watchdog said it’s probing whether Ticketmaster engaged in unfair commercial practices, and whether customers were given clear and timely information that the tickets could be subject to varied prices.

“It’s important that fans are treated fairly when they buy tickets, which is why we’ve launched this investigation,” said Sarah Cardell, chief executive of the CMA.

There’s a lot of déjà vu here. Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour also caused huge problems for the ticketing platform, and in some cases, fans wound up paying thousands of dollars.

Oasis fans also wanted in on the concert craze. What they didn’t expect were Swift-priced tickets.

In the fallout from the Swift debacle, the US Department of Justice sued Ticketmaster parent company Live Nation in May, accusing it of operating a monopoly that “suffocates its competition”.

The lawsuit mentions dynamic pricing and how it leads to higher face value prices, though it wasn’t the crux of the department’s argument.

For the Gallagher brothers, there’s a lot of money at stake. Music industry sources said the 19 gigs — there were two shows added just this week — could fetch hundreds of millions of pounds.

But we’re curious how much Ticketmaster’s legal fees might cost.

How’s CVC doing after its IPO?

Major European private equity shop CVC Capital Partners reported a recovery for its spending and dealmaking in its first results since going public earlier this year.

It’s a welcome result in an industry hungry for good news.

New investments of investors’ cash by the Luxembourg-based group in the first half of this year were up 63 per cent compared with a year earlier, while the amount generated from exits more than doubled to €9.4bn.

“The first half of 2024 has been very significant for us,” chief executive Rob Lucas said on a call with journalists on Thursday morning, noting that the group had completed acquisitions of infrastructure and secondary firms in the same period, as well as successfully carrying out its long-awaited IPO.

The results are a signal that at least some of the strongest players in private equity are emerging from a two-year slump in which higher interest rates made buying and selling companies far harder — and in turn hampered fundraising.

In the second quarter, Apollo, Blackstone, KKR and Ares invested more than $160bn combined as conditions started to brighten.

But Lucas carefully added a note of caution, suggesting CVC might not make as many exits in the coming six months as it did in the first half of this year.

“Realisations are generally quite lumpy in the way that they can come through. And so we aren’t anticipating the same level of realisations in the second half,” he said.

Of course, Lucas couldn’t help joining the chorus bemoaning the likelihood of a higher tax rate for carried interest in the UK: “Will it influence where some people want to be based? Probably.”

He added that he hopes the UK government doesn’t wind up hurting the country’s competitiveness through the increases.

The big payday from Verizon-Frontier’s $20bn deal

Dealmaking is heating up in the fibre market, with Verizon agreeing on Thursday to buy US fibre internet provider Frontier Communications in an all-cash transaction for $20bn.

New York-based Verizon is trying to expand its broadband network across the country amid a race between top providers for who can access more customers.

Frontier has invested heavily to move away from copper pipes to fibre. The deal gives Verizon an additional 2mn fibre subscribers across the US (it currently has about 7mn).

T-Mobile earlier this year announced joint ventures with private equity groups EQT and KKR to buy Lumos and Metronet respectively.

The deal is a coup for some of Wall Street’s savviest distressed debt investors, who swept in when Frontier went bankrupt in 2020 after it took on too much debt from an earlier acquisition, DD’s Sujeet Indap writes for Lex.

Big investors such as Ares Management and Cerberus Capital Management were some of the company’s biggest noteholders at the time. The latter owned more than $500mn of the company’s debt, according to court filings.

In Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, the company transferred equity control to its bondholders, slashing $10bn of its $18bn total debt load. Frontier’s two largest shareholders are still Ares and Cerberus.

And there could very well be more lucrative deals on the horizon. Frontier rival Windstream also filed for bankruptcy during the pandemic and reorganised. Lumen, a third regional company, just completed a $20bn debt restructuring outside of court.

Both of them could soon be on the auction block as the fibre race continues.

Job moves

• Apollo has promoted Chris Edson to global head of origination. He’s worked at the group for 16 years, and has helped build its private credit origination platforms.

• JPMorgan Chase has rehired Ben Wilson as head of North America energy, power, renewables and mining M&A in New York. He was most recently at Guggenheim Securities as a senior managing director. The bank has also promoted Andrew Castaldo and Andrew Martin as co-heads of mid-cap M&A in New York.

• Man Group has appointed Paco Ybarra to its board. He spent more than three decades at Citigroup, most recently as chief executive of the bank’s institutional client group, before retiring in June.

• Linklaters has hired Michael Torkin as a partner and head of the firm’s US capital solutions and special situations. He previously worked for Simpson Thacher.

Smart reads

Fyre Festival II The phrase “Fyre Festival” has become synonymous with scams and disasters. Its creator is looking for a second chance, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Wall Street cheerleader The chief executive of Cantor Fitzgerald has emerged as Donald Trump’s right-hand man on the campaign trail — and his ear to Wall Street, Bloomberg reports.

Lawyer’s downfall Sal Strazzullo made his name representing minor celebrities. Then everything fell apart, The New York Times reveals.

News round-up

7-Eleven owner set to reject Couche-Tard takeover offer (FT)

Three former Wirecard executives found personally liable for €140mn (FT)

Pernod Ricard ditches Paris Saint-Germain deal after Marseille backlash (FT)

Asos sells majority stake in Topshop and Topman to Danish retail billionaire (FT)

US, Britain and Brussels to sign agreement on AI standards (FT)

PwC tells UK staff it will monitor office attendance (FT)

BNY seeks growth in investment services with managed account deal (FT)

Court puts block on sale of Raiffeisen bank’s Russian arm (FT)