David Beckham has sued Mark Wahlberg over a fitness brand deal that allegedly cost the English soccer star over $10 million, Radar reports.
Beckham’s DB Ventures Ltd company claimed that the actor “duped” him into working with F45 Training, an Australian gym franchiser that Wahlberg bought a minority stake in in 2019 and now serves as chief brand officer for, according to the report by Radar.
Beckham befriended Wahlberg after moving to Beverly Hills to play for the LA Galaxy team in 2007. In 2020, he agreed to become F45’s global ambassador, promoting the brand to his millions of Instagram followers in posts that have since been deleted.
The deal turned sour, however, and the former footballer is now claiming that he lost more than £8.5million in potential profit when stocks he was promised as payment in early 2022 were withheld until after the company’s share price had plummeted.
Per The Sun, Beckham is suing Wahlberg’s Mark Wahlberg Investment Group (MWIG) firm in addition to F45 founders Adam Gilchrist and Rob Deutsch.
In response, Wahlberg and his co-defendants denounced the allegations of “fraudulent conduct” as baseless and have asked a judge to dismiss the lawsuit.
“The 209-page, 610-paragraph SAC [complaint] tries to make up with length what it lacks in merit,” the motion to dismiss read in part.
Beckham teamed up with golfer Greg Norman in 2022 to sue F45 for over $18.85 million (£15.2million) in damages. They alleged that the company failed to comply with its contractual obligations in a timely fashion and gave “preferential treatment” to other investors, including Wahlberg. They were later told by a judge that they had to sue separately.
Another athlete, former NFL receiver Terrell Owens, filed a similar lawsuit against F45 in 2017, claiming that the company had failed to pay him over $700,000. A co-CEO denied the allegations, telling TMZ, “We’re not a company that doesn’t pay our bills.”
Although F45 began trading at $16 per share when it went public in 2021, shares in the company are now worth just 15 cents, according to recent market data.