Richard Marles meets crypto king Ed Craven at secretive ALP fundraising dinner
Billionaire crypto casino mogul Ed Craven last week broke bread with Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles at a ‘very small, super-high-end fundraiser’ dinner.
NSW
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Billionaire crypto casino mogul Ed Craven is dipping his toe into politics, attending a Labor Party fundraiser with Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles.
On Thursday night the co-founder of the online gambling hub Stake.com broke bread with the Deputy Labor leader at a “very small, super-high-end fundraiser” dinner, with the money going to Labor MP Michelle Ananda-Rajah.
Sources close to Mr Craven confirmed he been a guest at the fundraiser, which took place in a private dining room at Cecconi’s, a new Melbourne Italian eatery where a mains-sized veal cotoletta, green apple, savoy cabbage, mint salad will set the diner back a cool $62.
The crypto billionaire had been expecting Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to attend the dinner, but the 12 guests present had to make do with the Defence Minister.
The restaurant is close to St Georges Rd, where in 2022 Mr Craven broke the Melbourne house price record by spending $80 million on a 7187 square metre property that had lain derelict for two decades.
On the way into the dinner Mr Marles’ adviser Jett Fogarty, who will soon take over as Assistant State Secretary of the Victorian ALP, put his body in front of his boss in a vain attempt to stop us photographing the Deputy Prime Minister.
In 2023, The Australian estimated Mr Craven’s worth at $2.01 billion, a fortune derived from the cryptocurrency casino and gambling site, which between 2020 and 2023 saw its turnover jump from $409m to $3.94m.
The company, which now employs more than 300 people, last year bought the Alfa Romeo Formula 1 team, which it has rebranded.
It has also spent big on sponsorship deals with Canadian singer and rapper Drake, and English Premier League soccer club Everton.
More controversially, Mr Craven is also a co-owner of kick.com, a live-streaming service that has been criticised recently by Nine newspapers for what they claimed were the lax controls it exercises over the content it permits.
Since its launch in 2022, kick.com has grown to be the second-most popular live-streaming app on the web, but earlier this month it was alleged that a banned user of the site had coaxed underage girls to strip in video chats, while other users had live-streamed themselves having sex.
It was also reported that users to the site had allegedly brandished sex toys at children and made sexual comments toward girls as young as 13.
There is no suggestion that Mr Craven had any knowledge of these videos and what the users were doing.
A spokeswoman for Mr Marles confirmed the dinner was a fundraiser for Ms Ananda-Rajah but declined to comment further. Mr Fogarty directed questions to Mr Marles’ media adviser.
A spokesman for Mr Craven declined to comment.
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