Dozens of Celebrities, Including Tom Brady and Stephen Currey, seek to be dropped from #FTX Ponzi Promotion Lawsuit

On April 14, it was reported that several high-profile celebrities, including Larry David, Tom Brady, Gisele Bundchen, Stephen Curry, Udonis Haslem, Trevor Lawrence, Kevin O'Leary, Shohei Ohtani, David Ortiz, Naomi Osaka, and the Golden State Warriors NBA team, have requested the dismissal of a class-action lawsuit against them.

The lawsuit, which was filed in November 2022 by Edwin Garrison on behalf of himself and other investors, alleges that FTX, a crypto exchange platform, was fraudulent and preyed on unsophisticated investors.

The celebrities appeared in various advertisements related to FTX — including a Super Bowl ad — and heavily promoted the exchange on social media during 2021 and 2022.

Without these celebrity endorsements, the collapse of FTX likely wouldn’t have affected that many people. However, the celebrities' legal teams, argue that the plaintiffs have failed to prove that the celebrities' promotions influenced their investments or caused their losses. The motion also states that the investors have not differentiated between the celebrities involved in advertisements and FTX insiders, like Sam Trabucco and Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF).

The filing notes that the celebrities were doing a job and that a lawsuit against them would make every actor liable for selling securities by appearing in a brokerage advertisement. Furthermore, the stars did not promote investing in yield-bearing accounts (YBAs), which is the crux of the investors' case as they claim losses on such accounts.

According to the filing: "Plaintiffs simply were not injured by Movants (the celebrities). As their complaint lays bare, FTX — not Movants — allegedly enticed Plaintiffs into opening YBAs."

The lawsuit continues to make headlines, with investors seeking restitution for their losses, and the celebrities maintaining their innocence and requesting dismissal of the case.

In my opinion, I think those celebrities shouldn't get off the hook for this lawsuit. They convinced millions of people to sign up for this thing and ended up losing their money. It was their job to look into it and understand the risks before they started promoting it.

When you're famous, you have a lot of power, but with great power comes great responsibility. It's just not right to promote something like a Ponzi Scheme just for the money. If they don't face any consequences, it's going to set a bad example for other celebrities to do the same thing. So, the regulators and courts need to step up and make sure everyone involved is held accountable.