How superstar quarterback Tom Brady was 'blindsided' by the FTX 'crypto mess': report

06 July 2023

When the cryptocurrency exchange FTX filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in November 2022, liberal economist/New York Times columnist Paul Krugman predicted that more pain would be forthcoming in the crypto sector. FTX and other crypto operations, Krugman warned, didn't have a strong business model.

Celebrities who endorsed FTX were among the people who got burned when it went into Chapter 11. Two of them were football superstar Tom Brady and his ex-wife, Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bündchen.

In a New York Times article published on July 6, journalists Erin Griffith and David Yaffe-Bellany report that while pop stars Taylor Swift and Katy Perry "narrowly escaped the crypto mess," Brady (a quarterback for the New England Patriots and later, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers) and Bündchen were not so lucky.

"As an 'ambassador' for FTX," the Times journalists explain, "he had appeared at the company's conference in the Bahamas and in TV commercials that promoted the exchange as 'the most trusted' institution in the loosely regulated world of crypto. His money was also at stake. As part of an endorsement agreement Mr. Brady signed in 2021, FTX had paid him $30 million — a deal that consisted almost entirely of FTX stock, three people with knowledge of the contract said. Mr. Brady's wife at the time, the supermodel Gisele Bündchen, was paid $18 million in FTX stock, one of the people said."

Griffith and Yaffe-Bellany add, "Now, FTX is bankrupt, and Mr. Bankman-Fried is facing criminal fraud charges. Mr. Brady, 45, and Ms. Bündchen, 42, have been sued by a group of FTX customers seeking compensation from the celebrities who endorsed the exchange. On top of it all, the terms of the deal would have required the former couple, who divorced last year, to pay taxes on at least some of their now worthless FTX stock, two people familiar with the endorsement deal said."

The reporters note that Brady and Bündchen agreed to a deal with Bankman-Fried in June 2021, and that same year, they were part of a $20 million advertising campaign for FTX. Bündchen, earlier this year, told Vanity Fair she felt "blindsided" by FTX's downfall.

"When FTX collapsed last November," Griffith and Yaffe-Bellany recall, "the company’s $32 billion valuation — including Mr. Brady and Ms. Bündchen's $48 million of shares — plummeted to zero."

Find The New York Times' full report at this link (subscription required).

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