Taylor Swift is known not only for her music but also for her financial acumen. With a net worth of $570 million, 12 Grammy Awards, and more than 3.5 million fans registered for her US tour, she managed to avoid the FTX cryptocurrency platform debacle that has led a lawyer to demand $5 billion from other celebrities who endorsed the platform.
Adam Moskowitz is leading collective lawsuits not only against FTX but also Voyager Digital, now bankrupt, and promoters of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange. He has targeted Shaquille O’Neal, Tom Brady, Larry David, and over a dozen other promoters for endorsing advertisements for FTX without verifying whether they were promoting unregistered securities.
Taylor Swift dives head first into stage leaving fans speechless
He alleged that these celebrities failed to perform their due diligence to verify whether they could be infringing the law before endorsing digital and TV ads for FTX. “The only person I found who did that was Taylor Swift. In our investigation, we found that Taylor Swift asked them, ‘Can you tell me that these are not unregistered securities?’,” Moskowitz said.
Moskowitz’s class-action lawsuit adheres to a Florida law that prohibits the promotion of unregistered securities and does not necessarily require that the promoter has committed any deception to be sued. Moskowitz hopes that celebrities and influencers will be more careful in promoting cryptocurrency companies in the future.
FTX imploded last November due to concerns that the combination of funds with its sister firm, Alameda, led to massive customer withdrawals. It did not have enough money to meet that demand, in part because of excessive spending and a $65 billion credit line, according to Business Insider.
FTX founder was arrested in December
Sam Bankman-Fried, FTX’s founder and CEO, was arrested in the Bahamas a month later and faces over 100 years in prison if found guilty of charges including securities fraud, money laundering, and bribery. FTX has recovered more than $7.3 billion in cash and liquid cryptocurrencies, according to Reuters.
The company’s lawyer, Andy Dietderich, said they are starting to think about the future after months of efforts dedicated to collecting resources and discovering what went wrong under Bankman-Fried’s leadership.