Ticket scalping prohibited in Brazil
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July 28th, 2010
Brazilian newspapers are reporting that President Lula approved a law which, supposedly, improves on safety and organization of sports events in Brazil; as commented on this other post, this new law is actually an amendment to an older law, which was already good enough.
The main changes brought about by this new amendment are: rioting is now a crime (it was an infraction, punishable with restrictions to attending events – now it is punishable with imprisonment); frauding results of games is now a crime (with this law, this referee would have been arrested); ticket scalping is now a crime.
Ticket scalping (the action of buying tickets for face value and sell it for market value) is common in Brazil. Given the lack of organization of Brazilian football, it is often better to buy tickets from a scalper, and save the time and headache needed to buy tickets at the official box offices.
The situation in Brazil is different from other countries, where ticket arbitrage is common – stubhub is just an online ticket scalper. In Brazil, it is common that people with privileged rights (for example, the staffs of the clubs involved in an important match) retain batches of tickets and pass them over to the scalpers.
So the law now consider as crimes:
- selling tickets for prices higher than face value: from one to two years in jail
- facilitating ticket scalping (i.e., providing tickets for ticket scalpers to sell): from two to four years in jail
- if the facilitator has privileged access to tickets: from four to six years in jail
Enforcement of this law is unlikely, EXCEPT, of course, during the World Cup, when FIFA will use their power to protect their financial interests.