Popular crypto trader and YouTuber Brian Jung says he’s been turning down offers from crypto companies wanting to partner up ever since he was caught with his pants down when FTX collapsed.
He admits it was one of the “lowest moments” of his career.
“I’ve actually turned down more than seven figures in sponsorship deals and even things like KOL [key opinion leader] partnerships that a lot of influencers do,” Jung tells Hall of Flame.
“Since FTX, we’ve learned our lesson and we’re very careful when working with any company,” he adds.
Jung even said no to crypto exchange Coinbase, which he reckons is “way different” to FTX because it is a publicly traded company on the U.S. stock market.
It’s much harder to cook the books FTX-style when you have to regularly disclose company financials to the public.
Jung also got caught up in a massive billion-dollar class-action lawsuit along with a bunch of other celebs and influencers who had endorsement deals with FTX before its bankruptcy.
Pretty nerve-wracking for a guy who was only 25. In the end, he essentially did the whole FTX influencer gig for free.
“We ended up actually settling with them. So we’re one of the few people to settle with them and that just means that we actually paid back the money that we got from the FTX sponsorships.”
Although he has a relatively modest X following of 61,400 users, the bulk of his audience tunes in to his YouTube channel for hot crypto tips. There, he boasts 1.78 million subscribers.
He’s unsure how many he actually convinced to join FTX, and although he’s settled with the plaintiffs, he thinks the big beneficiaries are the lawyers.
“At the end of the day the people who are actually making money from this are the lawyers that represent the so-called victims,” he says.
Even though Jung was “very dangerously close to losing everything” in FTX, he’s still been able to take care of his parents’ mortgage and give them a monthly allowance.
It’s a cautionary tale for any influencer out there because when FTX was at its peak, it seemed like a pretty safe bet to get behind.
“It’s like how much more due diligence can we actually do,” he says, stressing that back then, FTX had partnerships with just about everyone and everything, from Tom Brady to the Super Bowl and Major League Baseball.
“It’s like one of the biggest banks or institutions in the world who at that time just seemed like they were like the gold ribbon company, right?” he states.
How did Brian Jung achieve X fame?
Jung tried his hand at different finance content before discovering crypto.
About five years back, Jung started making videos about credit cards. Then, he moved on to covering stimulus checks during the COVID-19 pandemic before jumping into crypto content.
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This led to a steady increase in his YouTube followers, with some of them following Jung to other platforms, including X.
“YouTube is what we’re good at, our bread and butter, which is high-value content on YouTube instead of trying to adapt and always doing new things,” he explains.
Like many crypto influencers, he deals with the occasional impersonator, which he makes a fuss about online because crypto and impersonators don’t mix well for anyone.
What type of content do you like?
Jung enjoys X for its real-time crypto updates but is slow to mention any favorite accounts.
“A lot of the best alpha is there; that’s where we’ve been able to network with other CEOs,” he explains.
Jung’s got some solid insights to offer, and he’s also a bit of a joker, but it’s not too tough to figure out when he’s doing either on X.
When probed harder, Jung caved and let us know he is really enjoying the content of Jesse Pollak, the main developer for Coinbase’s layer-2 scaling solution, Base.
“He gives off a really solid energy. Just talking about that road map of Base and how they’re getting integrated into everything. And he actually really dialed in on the market this time around,” he explains.
“A lot of people are saying he’s like the TV ready Vitalik Buterin of Ethereum.”
Predictions?
Jung spends about two-thirds of each week digging into crypto tokens, so Hall of Flame is eager to hear what alpha he’s got to dish out.
“I’m spending 14-16 hours a day on average right now researching coins (and) connecting with founders talking with my team,” he explains.
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Jung is feeling especially bullish on Aerodrome Finance (AERO), which is an automated market maker (AMM) designed to be Base’s central liquidity hub. The DEX has grown its TVL by more than 380% in just over two months to $580M.
In just several months, he’s already seen nearly a 10x increase in gains on AERO, making his first million on a “single position.”
Despite the fact that its fully diluted market cap has “already broken a billion dollars already,” Jung is predicting big things ahead.
“Aerodrome’s conservative target is still around the three to five dollar range if we can compare Aerodrome to the likes of Uniswap,” says Jung.
While it must be said that people often predict big things for their big bags, Jung says that $20 is possible for AERO if Bitcoin hits the $125,000-$150,000 mark.
“I think it gets a little bit crazy when people are calling a hundred dollar Aerodrome, but I do see it here and there but I’m giving you the most realistic price target in the most favorable conditions,” he adds.
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Ciaran Lyons
Ciaran Lyons is an Australian crypto journalist. He’s also a standup comedian and has been a radio and TV presenter on Triple J, SBS and The Project.
