Investor, “Shark Tank” choose and CNBC contributor Kevin O’Leary mentioned Thursday he is misplaced the entire $15 million FTX paid him to behave as a spokesman for the now-collapsed crypto alternate that some have known as fraudulent.
O’Leary and different celebrities, corresponding to Tom Brady and Larry David, have been sued by FTX buyers who say the alternate’s ambassadors ought to have achieved extra due diligence and exercised a larger stage of care earlier than selling the crypto empire.
The Canadian investor was grilled by CNBC’s “Squawk Box“ hosts over his failure to correctly assess the dangers related to investing and selling FTX. O’Leary mentioned that he fell prey to “groupthink,” and that none of his funding companions had misplaced cash.
“Total deal was just under $15 million, all in,” O’Leary mentioned. “I put about $9.7 million into crypto. I think that’s what I lost. I don’t know. It’s all at zero.”
He additionally mentioned he had greater than $1 million of FTX fairness, now rendered nugatory by the chapter safety course of. The stability of slightly over $4 million was purportedly eaten up by taxation and agent charges, in keeping with O’Leary.
O’Leary promoted FTX aggressively on Twitter and on-line, touting his shut reference to disgraced founder Sam Bankman-Fried, who’s going through a number of investigations.
When O’Leary first started to advertise FTX, he mentioned it was FTX’s compliance methods that drew him to spend money on the crypto alternate.
“Finally solved my compliance issues with #cryptocurrencies,” O’Leary wrote on LinkedIn and in a since-deleted August 2021 tweet.
Eventually, Delaware chapter safety filings by new FTX CEO John Ray III would time period FTX’s threat, audit and compliance procedures “a complete failure of corporate controls.”
“It was not a good investment,” O’Leary mentioned Thursday.
Disclosure: CNBC owns the unique off-network cable rights to “Shark Tank.”
