MAYWEATHER VS PACQUIAO: Resale Ticket Price Floor Drops 19%

Boxers Floyd Mayweather Jr, left, and Manny Pacquiao, right, pose with a World Boxing Council (WBC) belt during a press conference Wednesday, April 29, 2015, in Las Vegas. Photo: AP

Resale ticket prices for Saturday’s (May 2) fight between Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao are dropping as new inventory floods the secondary market.

The cheapest ticket on StubHub is now listed at US$3,389 (US$4,475), a 19 per cent drop from Tuesday’s get-in, US$4,200, as inventory has surged. StubHub is requiring that all sellers show proof of tickets – a break from the more common practice of allowing brokers to list on speculation – and the authentication process had led to a late flood of listings.

Bloomberg reports:

“The average ticket price is still at around US$6,300, which is higher than big events such as the Super Bowl, though at lower volume,” StubHub spokesman Cameron Papp said in an e-mail.

The cheapest sold on the San Francisco-based secondary market was an upper level seat for US$3,900. The most expensive sold so far was a US$35,000 floor seat.

Aggregator TiqIQ has also seen a dip in prices. The site’s cheapest listing has dropped 29 per cent to US$3,182 from last week, according to spokesman Chris Matcovich. The average listing is now US$9,756, a 16 per cent dip in that same time period.

Matcovich said the falling prices were a product of the small window – nine days – between the distribution of tickets and the event. Big fights typically sell tickets 10 weeks in advance.

“The market would have been bigger if people were given enough time to book, hotel, flight and etcetera in advance,” Matcovich said in an e-mail.

Mayweather and Pacquiao, both welterweight title holders, will meet on Saturday at the MGM Grand Garden Arena for the most lucrative bout in boxing history. At least US$300 million in revenue, largely from pay-per-view purchases and ticket sales, will be shared by the fighters, organizers say.

Ticket Pickup

Yesterday (April 29) was the first day that anyone who bought seats through last week’s limited public sale was allowed to pick up the physical tickets. That’s contributed to the increase in inventory on a lot of resale sites.

StubHub has also seen resale demand for tickets to Friday’s weigh-in. Those tickets sold to the public for US$10 with all proceeds going to charities of the two fighters’ choosing. The average sell price on StubHub is US$155, a 1,400 percent premium, with all of StubHub’s profits also going to charity.