Does Nike have an ad campaign featuring Sydney Sweeney with the slogan, "Buy the stock. Just do it."? No, that's not true: The fake ad circulating on social media features an AI-generated likeness of Sydney Sweeney. The meme surfaced after the finance news broke that Nike would no longer be included in the S&P 100 index after Sept. 21, 2026 -- but it is not a real ad campaign from Nike.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) by the @wallstmemes account on X on Sept. 8, 2026. It read:
Nike CFO: We're getting kicked out the S&P 100
Nike CEO: Okay, it's time to deploy the jugs
This is what the post looked like on X at the time of writing:
(Image source: post by @wallstmemes on X.)
The text on the meme reads:
Just do it.
Sydney Sweeney
Nike Athlete
An earlier version of this fake ad (archived here) was posted by the @dennishegstad account on X on Sept. 7, 2026.
This is what the post looked like on X at the time of writing:
(Image source: post by @dennishegstad on X.)
In this version the post carries a "Made with AI" label and the text reads:
Buy the stock. Just do it.
A Sept. 4, 2026, press release (archived here) from S&P Global contained a chart indicating that Nike would be deleted from the S&P 100 index on Sept. 21, 2026 as part of the quarterly rebalance. On Sept. 6, 2026, a senior contributor to Forbes, Jim Osman (archived here) wrote:
S&P Dow Jones Indices will remove Nike from the S&P 100, an index intended to represent some of America's largest and most established blue-chip companies. It will remain in the S&P 500, so I would not overstate the mechanical significance of the change, but after everything that has happened to Nike over the last several years, the timing is difficult to ignore.
The internet responded with AI-generated Sydney Sweeney memes. On Sept. 7, 2026, the @ProtestOnX account on X tagged Nike in a post and pitched this idea (archived here):
If you use this @Nike you owe me a million up front. Just trying to bail your woke asses out... Payment to be received in Trump $100.00s
The image included with the post (pictured below) was a spinoff from the American Eagle Great Jeans campaign (archived here), where Sweeney was originally pictured barefoot, wearing jeans and a denim jacket, but in this altered image Sweeney is shown instead with white tennis shoes on her feet. The post carries a "Made with AI" disclaimer and the slogan reads:
Great jeans look perfect in Nikes
(Image source: post by @ProtestOnX on X.)
A search on Google News for the terms "Nike Sydney Sweeney" did not produce any relevant results (archived here). The same search on Yahoo News (archived here) also had no relevant results. A manual review on Nike's newsroom press releases (archived here) and a search for "Sweeney" with the site's search tool (archived here) did not show any recent or relevant articles announcing a partnership with Sweeney.
Lead Stories uploaded the three images to the AI-generated Content Detection Tool at Hive Moderation (pictured below). The results were similar, the image from @wallstmemes received a rating of 99.7% likely to be AI-generated (archived here), and the image from @dennishegstad received a rating of 99.9% likely to be AI-generated (archived here). The final image from @ProtestOnX received a rating of 96.8% likely to be AI-generated (archived here).
(Image source: Hive Moderation.)
(Image source: Hive Moderation.)
(Image source: Hive Moderation.)
