Warriors' Stephen Curry, Serena Williams among celebrities named in Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT lawsuit - CBS Sports

Golden State Warriors prima Steph Curry and tennis fable Serena Williams are among the celebrities named successful a class-action suit against the creators of the NFT institution Bored Ape Yacht Club. The ailment filed earlier this week successful California alleges that personage endorsement artificially accrued the involvement and worth of the BAYC NFTs and Yuga Labs' Apecoin crypto tokens, which resulted successful "staggering losses" for buyers.

"Defendants' promotional run was wildly successful, generating billions of dollars successful income and re-sales," reads the complaint. "The manufactured personage endorsements and misleading promotions regarding the motorboat of an full BAYC ecosystem (the alleged Otherside metaverse) were capable to artificially summation the involvement successful and terms of the BAYC NFTs during the Relevant Period, causing investors to acquisition these losing investments astatine drastically inflated prices."

The suit claims the marque relied "heavily connected the cognition that 'joining the club' (i.e., buying a BAYC NFT)" would bring buyers presumption and supply them with benefits, entree to events and "other lucrative concern opportunities exclusive to BAYC holders." 

Justin Bieber, Madonna, Kevin Hart, Snoop Dogg and Jimmy Fallon are immoderate different "highly influential celebrities" listed successful the lawsuit. The ailment claims that astir of them were recruited by endowment manager Guy Oseary, and that the celebrities were discreetly paid for their endorsements done the crypto steadfast Moonpay.

"In truth, the Executive Defendants and Oseary utilized their connections to MoonPay and its work arsenic a covert mode to compensate the Promoter Defendants for their promotions of the BAYC NFTs without disclosing it to unsuspecting investors," reads the complaint.

Curry is besides a defendant successful a class-action suit against FTX, a institution that filed for bankruptcy successful November and saw CEO Sam Bankman-Fried resign aft his assets plummeted from $16 cardinal to virtually nothing. The defendants successful that suit include Tampa Bay Buccaneers backmost Tom Brady, NBA fable Shaquille O'Neal and Jacksonville Jaguars backmost Trevor Lawrence, among different high-profile figures.