US Rapper T.I. Sued for $5 Million After His Token Allegedly Fails

U.S. rapper T.I., also known as T.I.P., is being sued for $5 million by a group of people after his FLiK token has reportedly failed, according to court documents obtained by U.S. celebrity news media The Blast.

As per the lawsuit cited by the outlet, the group of 25 persons claims that they have invested $1.3 million in “now worthless securities called FLiK Tokens,” promoted by T.I. and his business partner Ryan Felton. The plaintiffs state that the token was actively endorsed in social media both by celebrities and experts to create an impression of  “a valuable liquid investment.”

However, the group continues, T.I. and Felton defrauded them by using the money raised to drive the token’s price up, and when the prices fell down, they dumped the FLiK and disappeared. According to the lawsuit, Felton even created a new company, stating it had acquired FLiK and telling investors he had nothing to do with it.

Now the plaintiffs want to obtain a minimum of $5 million in damages from T.I. and Felton. The lawyer for the celebrity did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the matter to The Blast.

The FLiK was announced back in September 2017 and also actively supported by U.S. actor Kevin Hart, who promoted the coin on his Twitter. As U.S. tabloid TMZ reports, the promo campaign also mentioned Mark Cuban — a billionaire and owner of the NBA's Dallas Mavericks. According to the stats provided by CoinMarketCap, the coin was traded at its peak on Oct. 17, 2017, when its price reached 21 cents. Seeing a brief takeoff in February, it slowly declined to nothing, traded at $0.001 as of press time.

Celebrities have often become involved in crypto-related activities from time to time, but their attempts and promotions do not always succeed. For instance, another U.S. rapper Ghostface Killah — a member of renowned Wu Tang Clan — co-founded an Initial Coin Offering (ICO) that hoped to raise up to $30 million. However, his Cream Capital was later suspended “with no plans to hold the token sale in the future.”

Floyd Mayweather, one of the world’s famous boxers and the highest paid athlete of his discipline, also engaged in an ICO, dubbing himself as Floyd “Crypto” Mayweather. Later in 2018, one of the coins he backed, Centra, was charged with fraud by U.S. securities watchdog SEC.

Another celebrity to recently join a crypto startup was Johnny Depp, who partnered with crypto-powered social entertainment platform TaTaTu. Cointelegraph reported in mid-October that the American movie star is going to team up with the TaTaTu founder in order to jointly create and produce film and digital content.