Live Nation seeing healthy ticket sales, stock up

By Yinka Adegoke

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Live Nation Inc, the world's largest concert promoter, said on Thursday it has seen no weakness in ticket sales for 2009 despite investor concern that fewer fans will pay to see their favorite bands due to the recession.

Live Nation shares rose 18 percent in late-afternoon trading.

Chief Executive Michael Rapino said the company sold 2.91 million tickets for 1,213 shows for the year ended December 15, compared with 2.95 million tickets from 1,206 shows a year earlier. Most concert tickets are sold many months in advance.

"You can't have those numbers sitting here today and say no one's going to show up next year; we'd have felt something by now," Rapino said in a presentation to investors.

He noted that fourth-quarter sales were not down from the year-ago period despite the severe economic downturn that started around October.

"We don't see it yet," he added.

He said average net ticket prices for arena shows for big name artists did drop to $68.18 from $75.34 in the year-earlier period.

"In our business we don't mind if a price of a ticket goes down; our job is to get as many bums in seats as possible," said Rapino.