A new class action lawsuit filed by two American women, Tiffany Hines and LaShawnna Ridley, on December 31, 2025, accused musician Drake and the famous online streamer, Adin Ross, of using funds from the cryptocurrency gambling platform, Stake to artificially boost the rapper’s streams, royalties, and popularity on music streaming platforms, including Spotify, Apple Music, amongst others.
Hines and Ridley claimed in the lawsuit that the scheme misled listeners by “fabricating popularity,” “distorting recommendation algorithms,” “disparaging competitors and music label executives,” and “misleading royalty and recommendation engines.”
Here is a complete timeline of everything we know so far:
August 2022: The rise of Stake.us
In August 2022, Stake.com, a growing Curaçaoan cryptocurrency-based online casino co-founded by “Australia’s youngest billionaire,” Ed Craven, launched a new site Stake.us, for users in the US. At the time, the website had been operating since its launch in 2017 in other markets.
A report in BitcoinChasers claimed the news was “greeted with community excitement and praise as very few crypto casinos have managed to legally operate under US laws.” Soon after, Stakes began a heavy marketing push that included signing top American celebrities including the musician Drake and streamer Adin Ross.
Oluwajeminipe Fasheun-Motesho
March 2023: Drake x Stake’s Deal is Public
It wasn’t clear when Drake first signed his deal with Stake. But a report in the Financial Times in March 2023 says that the endorsement deal, worth over $100 million a year, was signed sometime in 2022.
