Gaming Influencers FaZe Banks, Nadeshot Among Friend.tech's Top Earners

Prominent esports influencers Ricky “FaZe Banks” Bengston, Nordan “FaZe Rain” Shat, and 100 Thieves CEO Matthew “Nadeshot” Haag are among the top passive earners on new crypto platform Friend.tech, having gained over $73,000, $19,000, and $27,000 in passive income, respectively, since registering for its closed beta.

Friend.tech is a “social finance” browser-based application on the Base network—a new Ethereum scaling network launched by crypto exchange Coinbase—that allows users to trade “keys” (previously "shares") of various individuals. It’s a new riff on the familiar concept of “social tokens.”

Buying a key of an individual, whose wallet address is linked to their Twitter account, gives key buyers access to a dedicated group chat only for holders. As keys are bought and sold, the individual whose keys are being traded receives a small “fee”—a percentage of the sale—in Ethereum. 

According to data from a Dune Analytics dashboard, FaZe Clan co-owner Banks has seen nearly 872 ETH in total volume traded of his keys on Friend.tech at time of writing, granting him over 43.19 ETH in passive income via transaction fees. Since FaZe Banks signed up on August 20, this means he’s earned roughly $72,000 in less than one day. 

FaZe Rain, another content creator who signed up for the platform Monday, has already garnered over 226 ETH in volume, resulting in over 11.3 ETH in earnings (about $19,000) in less than 24 hours.

Nadeshot, who was a professional Call of Duty player before founding the esports and gaming lifestyle brand 100 Thieves, signed up for FriendTech on August 20. His name has already seen over 322 ETH in total key volume traded, granting him over 16.13 ETH in fees, which is roughly $27,000.

FriendTech isn’t Nadeshot’s first foray into crypto, however. 100 Thieves gave out over 300,000 Polygon NFTs in February 2022 to celebrate a League of Legends win, and Nadeshot himself previously rocked a CryptoPunks NFT as his Twitter profile picture.

Friend.tech Founders Say Viral Crypto App Is Surprising Them Too: 'We Want to Catch Our Breath'

Friend.tech, the new decentralized social media platform from the makers of Stealcam, has already, in its mere two weeks of existence, seen an extraordinary run. Now its developers tell Decrypt that they’re planning various fixes and features—after they catch their breath. The app, which is built on Coinbase’s Base scaling network for Ethereum and lets users buy and sell “keys” (originally, “shares”) in their favorite Twitter accounts, has generated a whopping $2.88 million in protocol fees. In...

Banks is also known as a trader of valuable NFTs (including CryptoPunks) and has been accused of participating in pump-and-dump crypto scams in the past.

Friend.tech’s closed beta launched on August 10, and the platform has already seen over 1.1 million keys traded across over 935,000 transactions, according to a Dune dashboard’s data. The platform remains invite-only for now—and it’s unclear when it will be opened up to a broader audience.