So what is up with box office data?

[vncsmoraes 1,275]

This is something I've noticed not just for M but many other artists: a lot of concerts that show up on the official Billboard box office score as "sold out" are far below the venues' actual capacities and fans have noticed for a fact some of the shows they were in were visibly not sold-out.

Yet, it's not like it happens with every artist and every date, even in the same tour.

Take S&S, for example: the Seville show appears as not being sold out (47,712 / 59,258), yet the show in Munich shows as sold out (35,127 / 35,127), even though the stadium has a permanent capacity of 69,650 and I've read reports by people who attended that concert who noted it was "far from sold out". 

The MDNA Tour Rio concert in 2012 which I attended *looked* sold-out, but they brought the provisional VIP stands closer and my boyfriend at the time, who attended the venue in  the previous Rock in Rio edition, told me they made the space a lot smaller and the total attendance (34,709) is far below the 90,000 venue capacity.

So why some shows seem to be informed correctly and others don't?

[Régine Filange 2,582]

If 35,127 out of 35,127 tickets sold = sold out. Doesn't matter if the stadium has capacity of 69.000 people. They don't have to create the same amount of tickets as the capacity of a stadium.

[A. A. Aardvark 4,830]

There shaving the amount of seats #officially b4 a gig so they can say it sold better ?
It's nothing new as Studio 54 was always packed, then I read of it having movable walls !