SEC socks Mayweather for crypto gigs

Retired boxer Floyd Mayweather may be undefeated in the ring, but he just lost against the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Mayweather and music producer DJ Khaled each settled charges with the SEC Thursday for failing to disclose payments they received for promoting initial coin offering investments last year.

It’s the first time the SEC brought charges for plugging ICOs — sig- naling the regulator’s increasing crackdown on the crypto space.

“Get yours before they sell out, I got mine...” Mayweather tweeted about the Centra Tech ICO, while failing to disclose that he received $100,000 from the coin issuer for the promotional tweets, the SEC said.

Mayweather beat the drums for two other ICOs and said on Twitter, “You can call me Floyd Crypto Mayweather from now on.”

Khaled called Centra a “game changer” on his social media ac- counts and reaped an undisclosed $50,000 payment.

Last year, the SEC warned that ICOs closely resembled traditional securities like stocks and would be regulated as such.

“Social media influencers are often paid promoters, not investment professionals, and the securities they’re touting, regardless of whether they are issued using traditional certificates or on the blockchain, could be frauds,” said Steven Peikin, SEC enforcement division co-director.

Both Mayweather and Khaled settled without admitting or denying wrongdoing.

Mayweather agreed to pay $614,775 in disgorgement, penalties and pretrial interest while agreeing to a three-year ban on promoting securities and cooperating with the SEC’s on-going investigation.

Khaled agreed to a two-year ban and $152,725 in disgorgement, penalties and interest.

Khaled and Mayweather declined to comment.