In an unusual incident, Kim Kardashian and other celebrities have been sued by investors of a cryptocurrency known as EthereumMax. Among the defendants also stand out celebrities such as former basketball player Paul Pierce and former boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr, in addition to the creators of the cryptocurrency.
The lawsuit alleges that EthereumMax is actually a fraudulent scheme in which the creators of the cryptocurrency inflated the price of their virtual asset, employing their own money and an ambitious marketing campaign, seeking to attract as many users in the shortest possible time: “In simple terms, the entire business model of EthereumMax is based on the constant use of marketing activities, seeking to deceive potential investors by offering an unusually high return when in fact inflated assets are being purchased,” the document states.
The plaintiffs claim that the celebrities collaborated with the developers of EthereumMax for its promotion and sale, in addition to taking advantage of the name of Ethereum, a project with which they have no relationship. The creators of EthereumMax are already aware of the demand, although they assure that eventually the truth will come to light.
As an example of these marketing campaigns, the plaintiffs filed a tweet posted on Pierce’s account in which the former player claims to have made a lot of money investing in EthereumMax. The developers of the project also used the fight between Mayweather and YouTuber Logan Paul to show multiple ads; Mayweather would also have invited attendees to a conference to invest in EthereumMax.
The plaintiffs also claim that Kardashian posted on her Instagram account an image related to the cryptocurrency, ensuring that her friends had made very good comments about this token.
In this regard, the developers of the project mention that their marketing campaigns are always oriented to awareness, so in no way encourage users to buy virtual assets without knowing the implications, so publications such as those presented by users should not be considered as evidence of fraud: “We want interested parties to investigate the project before investing”, mentions a spokesperson.
Still, specialists mention that the marketing campaign would have increased the value of the cryptocurrency by more than 1,300% compared to its launch price, so for a period of almost a month, the developers could have sold a large number of EthereumMax tokens before its value returned to a more stable level.
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