Former City banker Crispin Odey has dropped his £79m libel case against the Financial Times.
The move comes almost two years after he filed the claim and three years after the FT and Tortoise Media jointly published accusations that he sexually assaulted multiple women.
The FT planned to argue its reporting was substantially true and in the public interest.
The FT received a letter from Odey’s lawyers on Friday afternoon stating that the 67-year-old had been “forced to accept” that the publication was “likely to succeed in establishing” its public interest defence.
FT editor Roula Khalaf said: “This is a vindication for investigative journalism and for the victims whose stories of abuse we reported.
“The FT was always confident in its reporting. This is a case that should have never been brought.”
The paper said that two months ago it had served Odey with the “substantial” disclosure of evidence relating to its investigations into his behaviour that it had intended to rely on in court.
The FT added that 15 women had said they were willing to go to court to testify on its behalf, including three women whose allegations had not previously been reported.
Odey will now have to pay seven figures for the FT’s legal costs on top of his own, the newspaper said.
Odey was fined £1.8m and banned from the UK finance industry in March last year over how he handled disciplinary processes into his alleged sexual misconduct at his firm Odey Asset Management.
He is currently taking legal action against the Financial Conduct Authority, which ordered the fine.
Lawyers for the authority told a tribunal in London last month that a report published by law firm Simmons & Simmons in January 2021 found at least 46 historical allegations of inappropriate conduct by Odey towards female employees at OAM between 2003 and 2020.
Odey’s lawyers told the FT in the letter: “Having just endured the stress and strain of a three-week trial in the Upper Tribunal, he does not wish to pursue another lengthy trial at considerable cost, only to fail on the issue of public interest, even if he was successful, as he believes he would be, in demonstrating that he is not the violent predator he was presented as being in the articles.”
The FT said when the case was first brought that “our investigative journalism about Mr Odey was carefully prepared and publication was in the public interest.
“We stand by our reporting and look forward to vigorously defending it.”
The investigation was one of three stories that led to FT journalist Antonia Cundy being awarded New Journalist of the Year at the British Journalism Awards in December.
Cundy, the FT’s Madison Marriage and Tortoise’s Paul Caruana Galizia were finalists for Private Eye’s Paul Foot Award for Investigative and Campaigning Journalism for the story.
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