Shaquille O'Neal agrees to pay $1.8 million to settle with FTX investors

According to CNBC, American NBA legend Shaquille O’Neal has agreed to pay $1.8 million to settle a class action lawsuit initiated by investors due to the FTX bankruptcy incident. The agreement still needs to be approved by the court. Once it comes into effect, O’Neal will be relieved of all future legal liabilities in this case and will explicitly prohibit him from making any form of recovery request against FTX bankruptcy assets.

The lawsuit originated from the fact that after FTX filed for bankruptcy protection in November 2022, some investors filed legal charges against the relationship between the spokesperson and FTX. The plaintiff accused O’Neal of actively promoting FTX in many public events and social media platforms, and alleged that he was suspected of helping to promote unregistered securities and misleading the public about the security and compliance of the platform.

Unlike other former FTX spokespersons such as Tom Brady and Larry David, whose lawsuits have been dismissed, O’Neal has not been able to withdraw from the case due to the complicated process of serving legal documents. Previously, he said in an interview with CNBC that he was "just a paid advertising spokesperson" and denied any direct connection with the platform's operations.

The settlement agreement shows that the $1.8 million that O'Neal agreed to pay will be used to establish an investor compensation fund, and the specific distribution details will be formulated by the liquidation agency supervised by the court.

The progress of this case has attracted widespread attention and is regarded as one of the key cases of the legal liability boundaries of public figures in the FTX bankruptcy case. It has also triggered discussions in the industry on the risk awareness and compliance review of celebrity endorsements of crypto asset platforms.