Celebrities including Lindsay Lohan and Jake Paul have agreed to pay a collective $400,000 to settle SEC charges claiming that they promoted crypto investments without the proper disclosure.
The Securities and Exchange Commission charged eight celebrities with
"illegally touting" the tokens known as Tronix and BitTorrent.
- Six of the celebrities have now agreed to pay fines to settle the charges, without admitting fault.
- Lohan,
for example, has agreed to pay $30,000 in fines plus $10,000 in
earnings, while Paul will pay $75,000 in fines in addition to the
$25,000 he earned.
- The tokens come from cryptocurrency entrepreneur Justin Sun, who also faces SEC charges accusing him of securities law violations.
- In
its complaint, the SEC says Sun's companies — BitTorrent
Foundation, Tron Foundation, and Rainberry — offered up digital
currencies without the proper registration. Sun is also accused of
manipulative trading practices.
- The SEC claims Sun paid the
celebrities millions of dollars to endorse the unregistered offerings
while telling them not to disclose their compensation.
