Disgraced financier Odey drops £79m libel claim over sex assault investigation

In October 2022, Paul Caruana Galizia, then a reporter at Tortoise Media, which is now the owner of The Observer, spoke to a woman who alleged that Crispin Odey, whom she knew socially, had sexually assaulted her at a restaurant in Belgravia.

Rumours of sexual harassment and assault had long trailed Odey, a highly successful hedge fund manager, Brexit supporter and donor to the Conservative party. In 2020, he had been charged with indecent assault but he was cleared in 2021 owing to what the judge described as “inconsistencies” with the complainant’s account.

Bloomberg and the Sunday Times then separately published reports of allegations by different women against Odey.

Within weeks of speaking to the first woman, Caruana Galizia had spoken to four more, none of whom knew each other, who made similar allegations against Odey. In addition, there were a number of women who had worked at Odey Asset Management (OAM), his hedge fund, who alleged he sexually harassed them.

One of them, who was in her mid-20s, said Odey invited her for drinks at his house in Chelsea, south-west London,  where he “lunged” at her, “groping everywhere”, before exposing himself. Another woman described an alleged assault at Odey’s home in Gloucestershire during a shooting weekend in 2021. One woman said that being attacked by him was like being assaulted by an “octopus”.

In December 2022, Tortoise published a podcast called Octopus: The Allegations Against Crispin Odey. At the time, Odey said Tortoise’s allegations contained “very many falsehoods and inaccuracies” and there was nothing to be gained by engaging with Caruana Galizia. OAM said it couldn’t comment “due to confidentiality and privacy issues”. A former cabinet minister, who knew Odey well, accused Caruana Galizia of being “a muckraker of the worst kind”.

Caruana Galizia then teamed up with journalists at the Financial Times – Madison Marriage and Antonia Cundy – and together they spoke to at least 13 more women who said they had been sexually abused or harassed by Odey. The accounts, published in June 2023, included one incident in which Odey allegedly masturbated on a female entrepreneur after a business meeting and forced a friend’s hand on to his penis.

The FT reported that senior executives at Odey’s firm knew about his behaviour but waited more than 15 years before launching a formal investigation. In response, the company said it had anti-harassment policies in place and complied at all times with its legal and regulatory obligations.

The UK’s financial regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), had launched an investigation into OAM for “non-financial misconduct”. The FT’s reporting brought it to light and appears to have accelerated it.

Civil cases mounted and Odey was ousted from the business he had founded 30 years earlier. Later in 2023, OAM was broken up. He started legal proceedings against the FT.

In 2025, the FCA announced it would ban Odey from working in the financial sector and fine him £1.8m because of his efforts to thwart investigations into his behaviour. The FCA concluded that he “demonstrated that he is not a fit and proper person to perform any function related to regulated activities”.

In March this year, Odey spent three weeks in court appealing the FCA decision. The court heard from Timothy Pearey, a former chief executive of OAM, who described Odey as a “sex pest” and a “sociopath”. Giving evidence in his defence, Odey admitted he was “something of a dinosaur” and that he grabbed a former employee’s breasts without her consent. He is awaiting the outcome of the appeal.

Yesterday the FT reported Odey has dropped his £79m libel claim against the paper. His lawyers acknowledged he would struggle to win, as the FT’s reporting was “likely to succeed in establishing” a public interest defence. In the meantime, he faces what the FT has said is likely to be a seven-figure sum for the paper’s legal costs over his failed efforts to sue. It has reported that 15 women were willing to testify in court on the paper’s behalf. Odey continues to deny the allegations against him.

Roula Khalaf, the FT’s editor, said: “This is a vindication for investigative journalism and for the victims whose stories of abuse we reported.”

Caruana Galizia, who now works at the FT, posted the news that Odey had abandoned the libel case with a one-word comment: “Loser.”

Photograph by Jose Sarmento Matos/Bloomberg via Getty Images