Jay-Z Is Owed $6.8 Million in Unpaid Royalties From a Perfume Company, N.Y. Court Rules

Justin Ray
·2 min read
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Jay-Z landed another win in his court case against a perfume company.

A New York state appeals court sided with the rapper in his protracted legal battle against Parlux over a cologne endorsement, Billboard reported. In a ruling issued on Thursday, a five-judge panel agreed with a prior 2021 jury verdict that Jay-Z is not responsible for any wrongdoing in the deal and thus didn’t owe the company potentially $67 million in damages. The judges also agreed that Jay-Z was actually the one who was owed money, which amounts to almost $7 million in unpaid royalties.

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“There were multiple rational bases for upholding the jury verdict, and plaintiffs have not set forth a sufficient basis . . . to overturn it,” the panel ruled, according to the publication.

The whole debacle began in 2013 when the rapper launched a cologne called “Gold Jay-Z” in partnership with Parlux. In 2016, the perfume company sued the rapper, accusing him of failing to promote the fragrance, breaching the contract both parties agreed on, and dooming the product’s sales. Jay-Z countersued, claiming he had held up his end of the deal and that the company still owed him money, Billboard reported.

In late 2021, jurors largely decided in favor of Jay-Z following a three-week trial. Then in August 2022, a New York Supreme Court justice ruled that Parlux owed the rapper a total of $6.78 million in royalties, an amount that includes interest, according to Billboard. At this point, Parlux has the option to continue its challenge to prior rulings by taking the case to the Court of Appeals. A Robb Report inquiry to the company went unreturned.

The “Run This Town” rapper is certainly keeping busy. Not too long ago, his entertainment agency Roc Nation posted a letter on its website laying out its plan for a casino in Manhattan’s Times Square. The company said should it win the fierce competition to land a license for the N.Y.C project, the resulting casino would provide billions of economic benefit to New York.

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