According to a recent federal lawsuit, several celebrities, including Jimmy Fallon, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Madonna, have been accused of fraud for promoting Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs, New York Post.
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The group of plaintiffs claims that the celebrities sold off the NFTs — which have plummeted in value over the past year — by disclosing they had invested in the company behind them, Yuga Labs.
The company’s entire business model relies on covert marketing and promotion of highly paid A-list celebrities (without disclosure) to drive demand for Yoga Securities.
says the complaint filed Thursday in US District Court.
According to the article, Justin Bieber, Kevin Hart, Stephen Curry, Serena Williams, her husband, Reddit CEO Alexis Ohanian, Snoop Dogg, The Weeknd, and DJ Khaled are also involved in the case.
| NFTs are generated on the Ethereum blockchain, which is immutable. No one can change ownership of an NFT or recreate the exact same NFT. Therefore, the NFT is like a unique collecting card In an always open storefront that anyone can like, but only owned by one person (or more specifically, one cryptocurrency wallet) at any time. |
The lawsuit alleges that manager Jay Oseary was behind most of the promotions, recruiting celebrities to pay through MoonPay, a crypto company in which he also invested. In November 2021, Jimmy Fallon did a segment on NFTs on NBC’s The Tonight Show and told viewers that
He obtained his first Bored Ape NFT Yacht Club through MoonPay – without revealing his ownership in MoonPay.
The lawsuit also alleges that singer Justin Bieber disingenuously claimed to have purchased the NFT for $1.3 million when it was actually given to him for the promotion. In a statement, Yuga Labs said it believes the suit is without merit.
