Brian Jung, Corridor of Flame

In style crypto dealer and YouTuber Brian Jung says he’s been turning down affords from crypto corporations eager to accomplice up ever since he was caught together with his pants down when FTX collapsed.

He admits it was one of many “lowest moments” of his profession.

“I’ve really turned down greater than seven figures in sponsorship offers and even issues like KOL [key opinion leader] partnerships that numerous influencers do,” Jung tells Corridor of Flame.

“Since FTX, we’ve realized our lesson and we’re very cautious when working with any firm,” he provides.

Jung even mentioned no to crypto trade Coinbase, which he reckons is “method totally different” to FTX as a result of it’s a publicly traded firm on the U.S. inventory market.

It’s a lot more durable to cook dinner the books FTX-style when you must recurrently disclose firm financials to the general public.

Jung additionally acquired caught up in an enormous billion-dollar class-action lawsuit together with a bunch of different celebs and influencers who had endorsement offers with FTX earlier than its chapter.

Fairly nerve-wracking for a man who was solely 25. In the long run, he primarily did the entire FTX influencer gig without spending a dime.

“We ended up really settling with them. So we’re one of many few individuals to settle with them and that simply implies that we really paid again the cash that we acquired from the FTX sponsorships.”

Though he has a comparatively modest X following of 61,400 customers, the majority of his viewers tunes in to his YouTube channel for warm crypto ideas. There, he boasts 1.78 million subscribers.

He’s not sure what number of he really satisfied to hitch FTX, and though he’s settled with the plaintiffs, he thinks the massive beneficiaries are the legal professionals.

“On the finish of the day the people who find themselves really earning money from this are the legal professionals that signify the so-called victims,” he says.

Regardless that Jung was “very dangerously near shedding every part” in FTX, he’s nonetheless been in a position to deal with his mother and father’ mortgage and provides them a month-to-month allowance.

It’s a cautionary story for any influencer on the market as a result of when FTX was at its peak, it appeared like a fairly protected guess to get behind.

“It’s like how rather more due diligence can we really do,” he says, stressing that again then, FTX had partnerships with nearly everybody and every part, from Tom Brady to the Tremendous Bowl and Main League Baseball.

“It’s like one of many largest banks or establishments on the earth who at the moment simply appeared like they had been just like the gold ribbon firm, proper?” he states.

How did Brian Jung obtain X fame?

Jung tried his hand at totally different finance content material earlier than discovering crypto.

About 5 years again, Jung began making movies about bank cards. Then, he moved on to protecting stimulus checks throughout the COVID-19 pandemic earlier than leaping into crypto content material.

This led to a gentle enhance in his YouTube followers, with a few of them following Jung to different platforms, together with X.

“YouTube is what we’re good at, our bread and butter, which is high-value content material on YouTube as a substitute of making an attempt to adapt and all the time doing new issues,” he explains.

Like many crypto influencers, he offers with the occasional impersonator, which he makes a fuss about on-line as a result of crypto and impersonators don’t combine nicely for anybody.

What kind of content material do you want?

Jung enjoys X for its real-time crypto updates however is sluggish to say any favourite accounts.

“Numerous the most effective alpha is there; that’s the place we’ve been in a position to community with different CEOs,” he explains.

Jung’s acquired some stable insights to supply, and he’s additionally a little bit of a joker, nevertheless it’s not too robust to determine when he’s doing both on X.

When probed more durable, Jung caved and tell us he’s actually having fun with the content material of Jesse Pollak, the primary developer for Coinbase’s layer-2 scaling answer, Base.

“He provides off a very stable power. Simply speaking about that highway map of Base and the way they’re getting built-in into every part. And he really actually dialed in in the marketplace this time round,” he explains.

“Lots of people are saying he’s just like the TV prepared Vitalik Buterin of Ethereum.”

Predictions?

Jung spends about two-thirds of every week digging into crypto tokens, so Corridor of Flame is keen to listen to what alpha he’s acquired to dish out.

“I’m spending 14-16 hours a day on common proper now researching cash (and) connecting with founders speaking with my workforce,” he explains.

Jung is feeling particularly bullish on Aerodrome Finance (AERO), which is an automatic market maker (AMM) designed to be Base’s central liquidity hub. The DEX has grown its TVL by greater than 380% in simply over two months to $580M.

In simply a number of months, he’s already seen almost a 10x enhance in good points on AERO, making his first million on a “single place.”

Even if its absolutely diluted market cap has “already damaged a billion {dollars} already,” Jung is predicting massive issues forward.

“Aerodrome’s conservative goal remains to be across the three to 5 greenback vary if we will examine Aerodrome to the likes of Uniswap,” says Jung.

Whereas it should be mentioned that folks typically predict massive issues for his or her massive baggage, Jung says that $20 is feasible for AERO if Bitcoin hits the $125,000-$150,000 mark.

“I feel it will get a little bit bit loopy when individuals are calling 100 greenback Aerodrome, however I do see it right here and there however I’m supplying you with essentially the most life like value goal in essentially the most favorable situations,” he provides.

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Ciaran Lyons

Ciaran Lyons is an Australian crypto journalist. He is additionally a standup comic and has been a radio and TV presenter on Triple J, SBS and The Mission.