Shaquille O'Neal has agreed to compensate investors who allegedly purchased unregistered securities related to his embattled Astrals NFT project, according to a court filing Monday. .
Under the proposed settlement, O'Neal and related Astrals companies would pay $11 million in financial relief to compensate members of the settled class and to fund litigation costs. Pending court approval, O'Neal's NFT-related legal troubles will effectively come to an early end.
The putative class action lawsuit is on behalf of investors who purchased NFTs from O'Neill's Astrals project, which features 10,000 Solana-based “metaverse-enabled avatars,” or governance tokens linked to the project's DAO called GLXY. I was woken up.
“With so many NFT and crypto bankruptcies, these amazing resolutions are only possible because respected figures like Shaq stepped up to help other crypto victims.” attorney Adam Moskowitz told Decrypt. “Shaq was a victim of both the failed Astrals and FTX platforms.”
The lawsuit alleges that O'Neal took an active role in promoting Astral NFTs until abandoning the project in 2022. During his musical performances as DJ Diesel, he allegedly fueled interest in the project and linked its success to his own celebrity status on social media. .
In August, a federal judge in Florida partially dismissed the lawsuit, ruling that O'Neal could be considered a “seller” under securities laws. The incident, which Moskowitz described as a “serendipitous moment,” determined that O'Neill did not need to make any “personal” statements to continue the matter, only a financial motive tied to the online post. It was done.
In Monday's filing, the plaintiffs described the proposed settlement as an “excellent recovery,” pointing in part to “Astral Entities' current dire financial situation.”
In late October, Astrals told community members on Discord that the lawsuit had created an unsustainable “financial burden” and bankruptcy seemed inevitable. As a result, Astrals will be forced to begin reducing support for Astrals' GLXY token, the filing said.
As managing partner of the Moskowitz Law Firm, Mr. Moskowitz has led other celebrity-centered crypto lawsuits, particularly against FTX's promoters. Defendants in the case include pro football legend Tom Brady and comedian Larry David, who appeared in a commercial for a failed cryptocurrency exchange before the massive fraud was discovered. It is.
O'Neal allegedly made false promises before distancing himself from the project as FTX rocked the cryptocurrency market. A GIF from the movie The Wolf of Wall Street that O'Neal posted on Discord in the Astrals said, “I'm not quitting.” That was said to be his last post.
Moskowitz praised O'Neal in response to the settlement offer, but previously told Decrypt that “the biggest guy is hiding from our case,” referring to the FTX case. Moskowitz struggled to serve his basketball persona and accused O'Neal of creating a cat-and-mouse game.
After numerous attempts to serve Mr. O'Neill, the law firm claimed that Mr. O'Neill was finally served outside his home last year, but his lawyer disputed that he had documents thrown at his car instead. he claimed. A month later, while broadcasting an NBA game from what was once known as Miami's FTX Arena, O'Neal was briefed on FTX and his Astrals project.
Before the Astrals settlement was reached, O'Neill used novel arguments to try to get the case dismissed. For example, his lawyers argued that the digital assets in question were not intended for investors last year, but rather for gamers.
Still, the project's social media presence declined amid the lawsuit. For example, Astral's last post on Twitter (aka X) was in December 2023.
“Gm Solana,” the project writes. “We're still alive.”
Edited by Andrew Hayward
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