Adidas has announced their decision to terminate their agreement with Kanye West for comments he made that outraged the Jewish community.
“Adidas does not tolerate antisemitism and any other sort of hate speech. 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.
After a thorough review, the company has taken the decision to terminate the partnership with Ye immediately, end production of Yeezy branded products and stop all payments to Ye and his companies. Adidas will stop the Adidas Yeezy business with immediate effect.
The statement added that it was the “sole owner of all design rights to existing products as well as previous and new colorways under the partnership” and would provide more information during third quarter earnings on Nov. 9.
Adidas fell 4% in morning trading in Frankfurt, Germany, after Bloomberg reported early in the day it was planning to end the partnership.
Ye also lost a deal with Gap where his collaboration with both companies yielded billions of dollars in revenue.
Ye has publicly stated he wanted more creative control over his brand and that aspects of the agreements with the companies were not met which included building stand alone stores to sell his product.
Was this Ye’s way of severing ties to branch out on his own and bringing his products directly to the customer without a middle man? Time will tell.
