- Taylor Swift is the odds-on favorite to win the 2023 MTV VMA Artist of the Year award at online betting sites.
- Swift is on pace to break a touring record, with more than $1 billion in gross earnings from her Eras Tour.
- Beyoncé has the second-best odds to win VMA Artist of the Year behind Swift.
Will the Taylor Swift juggernaut keep on rolling at the MTV Video Music Awards? According to Bovada, Swift is well on her way to winning the 2023 VMA Artist of the Year award. Currently, Swift has -400 odds to win top honors at the VMAs on Tuesday, September 12.
Swift opened as a -120 betting favorite to win the VMA Artist of the Year. However, opportunistic bettors and “Swifties” quickly gobbled up the -120 odds, which sent Swift’s VMA odds skyrocketing to -400. When the odds were initially released, Beyoncé and Nicki Minaj had the second-best odds at +275.
Since then, Beyoncé and Minaj’s VMA Artist of the Year odds have taken a tumble. Currently, Beyoncé is alone as the second option at +375 odds. Minaj has fallen much further back, as the rapper is +450 to win the top award at the VMAs.
How do these odds translate to their actual chances? Swift’s opening chances were not the most convincing. At -120 odds, Swift had an implied probability of winning the VMA Artist of the Year at 54.5 percent.
After early bettors noticed the generous odds, Swift’s implied probability jumped to 80 percent at -400 odds. In summary, bettors have a plethora of confidence in Swift’s ability to be awarded the 2023 VMA Artist of the Year.
Swift’s Eras Tour Shattering Records
If her Eras Tour success is any indication, Swift should have -10000 odds to win the VMA for Artist of the Year. There have been several notable records that the tour has broken so far.
On March 17, 2023, Swift officially opened the Eras Tour at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona. According to Capital FM, the opening night concert broke the record for most-attended concert by a female in U.S. history. There were 69,000 in attendance for the Eras Tour show in Glendale.
Queen behavior 👑 On August 29th, Taylor Swift became the first female artist in Spotify history to reach 100 million monthly listeners. pic.twitter.com/p7smvexszE
— Spotify (@Spotify) August 29, 2023
Back in March, it was reported that her 52 U.S. dates would likely rake in roughly $520 million. This would make the Eras Tour the highest-grossing tour of all time. Note that Swift has added more dates since then.
Earlier this month, Swift added 15 new dates across the U.S. and Canada. Now, the Eras Tour is scheduled to run from March 17, 2023, to November 23, 2024, including dates overseas in Europe, Australia, Japan, and Singapore. With 146 shows planned, the tour is now projected to gross over $1 billion.
The concerts are bringing in over $13 million per night, with a total of $300 million earned through 22 tour dates in June. Pollstar has estimated that the Eras Tour could eclipse $1.3 billion when the tour is finally done.
That’s roughly double the gross revenue of the original estimates, based on 52 concerts. With that in mind, this tour will easily smash the record for the highest-grossing tour ever.
Swift Mania Causes Ticketmaster Fiasco
In addition to traditional records broken for sales, Swift has a unique record involving Ticketmaster. Never have so many people logged onto the Ticketmaster website for presale tickets than for the Eras Tour.
Per Ticketmaster, a record number of people logged onto Ticketmaster to purchase Swift tickets. Roughly 3.5 million people attempted to register for the presale, resulting in the largest presale in Ticketmaster history.
Additionally, on the date of the presale, over two million tickets were purchased. This is a record for tickets sold by an artist in one day on Ticketmaster. Naturally, the system could not keep up with the demand for Swift tickets.
The Ticketmaster website crashed and left thousands of Swifties demanding answers. Additionally, fans complained about not being able to purchase the tickets once they were in their carts and high fees.
“As I’m sitting in the queue looking, I’m seeing tickets going on resale prices for $10,000 or $20,000”, said Penny Harrison, who was protesting outside the Capitol building. “And if you were lucky enough to get tickets in your cart, they were gone before you had a chance to pay it.”
The issue landed in front of a US Senate hearing, as Live Nation, which owns Ticketmaster, was asked to answer questions regarding the debacle in January. CEO Joe Berchtold blamed bots for the fiasco.
“While the bots failed to penetrate our systems or acquire any tickets, the attack required us to slow down and even pause our sales. This is what led to a terrible customer experience that we deeply regret.”
"Ticketmaster ought to look in the mirror and say: I'm the problem it's me."
Government officials fire Taylor Swift lyrics at Live Nation President Joe Berchtold during the Senate hearing over the #ErasTour ticket fiasco. pic.twitter.com/gddZqEJolV
— Entertainment Tonight (@etnow) January 24, 2023
There isn’t another artist nominated for the 2023 VMA Artist of the Year that has been able to cause this much havoc. That being said, Beyoncé’s Renaissance Tour is having unbelievable success, as well.
Is There Value In Beyoncé’s VMA Artist of the Year Odds?
Swift’s Eras Tour isn’t the only tour piling up the cash and selling out football stadiums. Beyoncé has been enjoying an abundance of success on her Renaissance Tour. In fact, CNN reports that the Renaissance Tour is on pace to earn over $1 billion in gross revenue, too.
Beyoncé’s tour is scheduled to run from May 10, 2023, to October 1, 2023. Currently, there are 56 concerts planned, as opposed to 146 for Swift. While Swift crashed Ticketmaster, Beyoncé crashed both Ticketmaster and O2 for priority tickets in the UK.
Queen B may not gross as much as Swift in the end, but in only 56 shows, she is expected to eclipse the $1 billion mark. Nevertheless, Beyoncé’s VMA Artist of the Year odds are sinking, while Swift’s are rising quickly.
The 2023 MTV Music Video Awards are scheduled to be held at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey on Tuesday, September 12.
