Adidas ends ‘fight’ with Kanye West over antisemitism
Adidas has ended its “fight” with Kanye West over antisemitic comments he made in 2022, which scuppered the sports brand and US rapper’s “Yeezy” collaboration.
Adidas discontinued the collection at the time and started selling off Yeezy stock at wholesale prices.
However, on Tuesday, the firm said it had reached a settlement with Mr West to end all legal proceedings between them.
“There [aren’t] any more open issues and there is no… money going either way,” Adidas chief executive Bjorn Gulden said on a conference call.
“There were tensions on many issues [but]… both parties said we don’t need to fight any more,” Gulden said on the call about the firm’s latest financial results.
The drama with West “belongs to the past”, he added.
“When you have conflicts like this, you take provisions and you have legal opinions and there are negotiations and there are settlements being done, and this is the end to it.
“No-one owes anything to anybody anymore. Whatever was is history”, he said.
Ending the partnership has left Adidas with Yeezy stock worth around €1.2bn (£840m), with the sports brand selling product in batches and donating the proceeds to NGOs, including its own recently launched anti-discrimination foundation.
The final Yeezy stocks will be sold by the end of 2024, the company said.
The decision to move on from the “fight” marks a stark contrast to 2022. At the time, Adidas said it does “not tolerate antisemitism and any other sort of hate speech”.
It added: “Ye’s recent comments and actions have been unacceptable, hateful and dangerous, and they violate the company’s values of diversity and inclusion, mutual respect and fairness.”
Adidas and Mr West began collaborating in 2014, which led to a hugely successful sportswear brand.
Demand for Yeezy products did not let up even after the furore, with many Yeezy trainers doing well in the resale market and selling for hundreds – and sometimes thousands – of pounds.
West had his accounts suspended on Instagram and X (then known as Twitter) when he made a series of antisemitic comments in October 2022.
He repeated the claims in a number of interviews and podcasts, not all of which were aired, over the next two months.
In December that year, Mr West appeared on conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’ show InfoWars where he spoke of his admiration for Adolf Hitler.
The rapper, now separated from celebrity Kim Kardashian, was diagnosed with bipolar disorder years ago and has publicly spoken about his challenges with his mental health.
