No bailout for Hannah Montana fans

By Alister Bull

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Soaring black market prices for tickets to see pop idol Hannah Montana have enraged parents and prompted probes by several states' attorney generals, but the Richmond Federal Reserve says don't blame market forces.

"Yes, it may be unfortunate that some little girls won't be able to see Miley Cyrus (the real name of the performer who plays teenybopper Hannah Montana) in concert," the Richmond branch of the U.S. central bank noted in an article on its Web site.

"The more fundamental issue is that promoters of the Hannah Montana series apparently haven't priced tickets commensurate with demand, opening the door to a secondary market with much higher prices," the Fed said.

This secondary market has sky-rocketed. Hannah Montana tickets officially priced at $25-$65 for a show on Monday in Seattle were for sale on one major private on-line ticket brokerage for between $163-$393. Seats near the stage for a November 7 performance in Los Angeles were $2,427 each.

Hannah Montana is the TV alter-ego of 14-year-old Cyrus, who plays a teenager living a double life as a rock star on a hit Disney Channel cable show. The Hannah Montana 54-date "Best of Both Worlds Tour" began in St. Louis earlier this month.

Acknowledging the age group of the fan base -- mainly young girls -- was a soft target for scalpers, the Richmond Fed article nonetheless argued against cracking down on the secondary market in tickets.

Instead, it urged rationing tickets to make sure that they get to 'real' fans, now that the old-fashioned solution of sorting the diehard supporters from mere profit-seeking ticket speculators -- by making everyone line up to get tickets -- has been overtaken by technology.

"One version would be a system in which a certain number of seats are auctioned off to the highest bidders, with the remaining ones sold for a flat price.

"This aids the promoter in not over- or underpricing tickets beforehand and more closely mimics a true market for high-valued seats," the Richmond Fed said.

Ticket speculators charging exorbitant prices for big sports events or shows have provoked anti-scalping laws in parts of the United States. But the crestfallen expressions of young Hannah Montana fans has really struck a chord.

"I have a young daughter, and I really wish I could fix this problem for all the parents with disappointed kids right now," Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel said in a statement last month.

He launched an investigation after a Hannah Montana concert in Little Rock sold out a few minutes after the official sale opened, with tickets appearing soon after on various private websites pitched at much higher prices.

The Richmond Fed noted that there had been other suggestions for event promoters to winnow out scalpers by quizzing prospective ticket buyers to identify real fans. This might be flawed, but could still yield results.

"Perfect? Of course not. Scalpers could quickly educate themselves and use the same old methods to cut in line ahead of real fans. But at least this approach doesn't meddle with supply and demand," it said.