San Francisco - EBay Inc.'s ticket-reselling subsidiary StubHub announced a five-year deal Wednesday night making it the official source of secondary tickets for Major League Baseball.
The agreement puts StubHub in charge of secondary ticket sales at MLB Advanced Media LP's Internet site MLB.com, and for individual team sites, such as the San Francisco Giants' SFGiants.com.
Financial terms were not disclosed. But StubHub spokesman Sean Pate said MLB, which is owned by the 30 baseball franchises in Canada and the United States, would share revenue with the e-commerce company.
Buyers at StubHub.com pay a 10 percent fee, while sellers are charged a 15 percent commission. If a baseball ticket sells for $100, the buyer pays $110 and the seller pockets $85, so $25 would go to StubHub and the baseball teams.
Franchises don't have to let StubHub manage their secondary ticket sales, but if they don't, they cannot resell tickets from their own online store, Pate said. Sales will begin next spring and will cover tickets purchased for individual games and those owned by season holders.
"Every team has a vested interest in participating," Pate said. "The hope is that all 30 teams will participate."
Franchises could not immediately be reached for comment.
The agreement comes as legislators and franchises grapple with the thriving ticket resale market, which exists in a legal gray zone.
Most states have no restrictions on reselling tickets, even for a hefty profit. But several - including Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Kentucky, North Carolina and Rhode Island - have tight restrictions on selling tickets above face value.
Many season tickets, including those for New York Yankees games, have licenses forbidding scalping. Last year, the Yankees revoked season tickets of several people who sold through StubHub, eBay and other Web sites, and security guards at Yankee Stadium grilled fans seen carrying StubHub envelopes in an effort to nail season-ticket holders who were selling seats.
Meanwhile, Yankees officials were considering a plan to develop an in-house ticket-reselling site.
The NCAA signed a deal last year to resell tournament tickets through RazorGator.com. The NBA and some NFL teams have made Ticketmaster their official reseller under an agreement that gives teams part of the profit when a seat is resold.
San Jose-based eBay purchased StubHub in January for $310 million. StubHub was founded in 2000 by Jeff Fluhr, who was 25 at the time. Since its inception, it has brokered the sale of more than 5 million tickets.
StubHub buyers paid more than $400 million for tickets last year, generating more than $100 million in revenue for the company.
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