Footballer Cristiano Ronaldo is facing a class action lawsuit in the US over his promotion of Binance, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world. The plaintiffs claim his endorsement led them to make loss-making investments, they are seeking damages of a sum exceeding $1bn (£790m).
NFTs are virtual assets that can be bought and sold, but which have no real-world form of their own. In other words, they only exist digitally. Generally, they are used to mark ownership of something, such as a picture or video online.
In November 2022, Binance announced its first “CR7” collection of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) in partnership with Ronaldo, which the footballer said would reward fans for all the years of support, Ronaldo shared a post on his X [Twitter] page announcing the partnership, he told the investors “We are going to change the NFT game and take football to the next level.
The claimants allege that Ronaldo’s promotion of Binance led to a 500% increase in searches for the crypto exchange, which is registered in the Cayman Islands.
They also say it led people to use the firm to invest in what they call “unregistered securities” such as Binance’s BNB cryptocurrency.
According to the US Securities and Exchanges Commission (SEC) he said, ”When celebrities endorse investment opportunities, including crypto-asset securities, investors should be careful to research if the investments are right for them, and they should know why celebrities are making those endorsements.
Consultancy firm DeVere Group boss Nigel Green, said the problems at the heart of the case went wider than just one footballer, it is crucial to recognize that blaming Ronaldo alone oversimplifies a complex issue. Instead, attention should also be directed towards global regulators who have been slow to establish clear guidelines for this evolving financial landscape.
