In a new interview, one of the lawyers suing FTX for defrauding users has revealed how popular singer Taylor Swift turned down FTX's proposal. Turning down the proposal from FTX ultimately saved the singer from getting sued for promoting the failed exchange. Adam Moskowitz appeared on "The Scoop" podcast to discuss the lawsuit, revealing several things the public didn't know about the FTX case. The Securities and Exchange Commission (the case's plaintiff) sues FTX endorsers for $5 billion. This includes a list of celebrities who helped promote FTX to their social media audience. Tom Brady, Larry David, and Shaquille O'Neal are some celebrities being sued for the FX collapse.
But a popular celebrity didn't make the list, and it is Taylor Swift, whose inquisitiveness helped her stay out of the deal. According to the lawyer speaking about the FTX court case, he said that the deal with Taylor was the most valuable at $100 million. But surprisingly, the singer declined the deal after questioning the authenticity of FTX. According to the lawyer, all the celebrities that accepted an advertisement deal with FTX didn't do their due diligence before accepting such a deal. He also noted that the only celebrity who questioned FTX was Taylor Swift. "The one person I found that did that was Taylor Swift," Moskowitz said in the show.
As reported by the Financial Times, FTX was allegedly negotiating a $100 million advertisement deal with Taylor Swift. The deal included many important factors, like touring and selling NFTs as tickets. But as of 2021, when the FTX marketing team was asked why the deal didn't go through, they replied, saying that the deal was too expensive to carry out. But according to Moskowitz, all those were just an excuse for what happened. When FTX had presented the details of the deal to Taylor Swift, she asked them if they were registered securities. From the words of Moskowitz, Taylor Swift asked FTX representatives, "Can you tell me that these are not unregistered securities." This ultimately made the deal come to an untimely end, as FTX couldn't defend its proposal. This was how the singer was able to dodge the FTX deal, as celebrities who did are currently facing lawsuits after the FTX collapse. Also read: FTT Spikes After FTX announces Comeback.
SEC Lawsuit Against FTX
In a lawsuit against FTX executives last December, the SEC said they were charging the company and those responsible for promoting their products.
"From at least May 2019 through November 2022, Defendants, together with
Samuel Bankman-Fried (“Bankman-Fried”) and others, engaged in a scheme to defraud equity
investors in FTX Trading Ltd. (“FTX”), the crypto asset trading platform of which Bankman-
Fried and Wang were co-founders, at the same time that they were also defrauding the platform’s
customers. FTX raised more than $1.8 billion from investors, including U.S. investors, who
bought an equity stake in FTX believing that FTX had appropriate controls and risk management
measures."
According to the SEC lawsuit, Sam Bankman-Fried and his accomplice misrepresented themselves" To induce confidence and to drive consumers to invest in what was ultimately a Ponzi scheme." Also read: See How the Solana Ecosystem Has Failed Since FTX Collapse.