According to the New York Times, Tom Brady, the quarterback for the New England Patriots and seven-time Super Bowl champion, served as an ambassador for the FTX bitcoin and crypto exchange. He promoted the new company as the most dependable establishment in the cryptocurrency market through a variety of venues, including a Super Bowl advertisement, billboards, and an FTX conference hosted in the Bahamas. Brady’s own wealth was largely comprised of FTX.
FTX paid him $30 million as part of an endorsement arrangement he signed with the company in 2021; the payment was almost entirely in the form of FTX shares. This arrangement was part of the contract. Gisele Bundchen, his ex-wife and a supermodel, was granted 18 million dollars in FTX stock.
Last year, FTX was declared bankrupt, and its creator, Sam Bankman-Fried, is being probed for criminal fraud.Customers of FTX have launched a lawsuit against Brady and Bundchen in an attempt to obtain compensation from the celebrities who sponsored the exchange.
Brady and Bundchen’s issue is symbolic of a larger trend in which celebrities who championed or invested in cryptocurrencies are now coping with the fallout from the cryptocurrency market.
Paris Hilton, Snoop Dogg, Reese Witherspoon, Matt Damon, Kim Kardashian, Lindsay Lohan, Jake Paul, Soulja Boy, Lil Yachty, and Shaquille O’Neal are among the celebrities implicated in FTX controversies, including ones involving cryptocurrencies. However, FTX has received significant investment from institutional investors in addition to these celebrities. Sequoia Capital, BlackRock, Tiger Global Management, SoftBank, and Temasek are among the most well-known.
Brady helped to develop the 2021 venture Autograph, which supports celebrities in the sale of nonfungible tokens (NFTs).
Brady and Bundchen have been named as defendants in a lawsuit accusing celebrities of defrauding investors. Other defendants in this case include Larry David, Steph Curry, and Naomi Osaka. They were all FTX-compatible. Several celebrities, like Taylor Swift and Katy Perry, narrowly escaped becoming embroiled in the cryptocurrency saga by not finalising potential deals with FTX.