Tom Brady and Gisele Bündchen’s advisors “saw what they believed were legit financials” when they invested in FTX, per the Financial Times.
The then-couple owned 1.8 million shares in FTX between them, bankruptcy filings show.
But they lost millions of dollars when Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire collapsed in November.
Advisors to Tom Brady and Gisele Bündchen weren’t able to spot any issues with FTX’s underlying financials before the celebrity couple piled cash into the now-bankrupt crypto exchange, the Financial Times has reported.
The then-couple spent over $84 million buying 1.8 million shares in Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire after their team found no issues with its financial documentation, according to the report Tuesday.
Brady and Bündchen’s team were extremely diligent and “saw what they believed were legit financials,” an unidentified former FTX employee told the FT.
“People wanted shares. There was some FOMO, but people always saw financials,” the source said.
FTX filed for bankruptcy in November after CoinDesk reported that its sister trading firm Alameda Research held most of its portfolio in the exchange’s native FTT token.
Rival firm Binance responded by selling all of its FTT holdings, triggering a solvency crisis that eventually forced FTX to file for bankruptcy.
The following month, founder Bankman-Fried was arrested in the Bahamas and extradited to the US. Prosecutors say that he knowingly used at least $4 billion of FTX customers’ funds to prop up Alameda’s balance sheet.
Owners of FTX shares, including NFL star Brady and international supermodel Bündchen, lost all their investment due to the bankruptcy proceedings. That led to potential major losses for both NFL star Brady and international supermodel Bündchen.
The former couple, who divorced in October after 13 years of marriage, both promoted the crypto group.
Brady owned 1.1 million shares in his own name and was a high-profile brand ambassador, even appearing in three commercials for FTX.
Bündchen held another 700,000 shares, appeared in one of those ads, and promoted the exchange in an April 2022 edition of Vogue where she discussed “Crypto, Collaboration, And Helping FTX Donate Billions”.
The true extent of the couple’s losses is unknown because FTX was a private company, but Forbes previously estimated that Brady’s stake was worth as much as $45 million.
This story was originally published in February 2023.
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