HONG KONG — Thomas Lee, president of Ether Treasury firm BitMine Immersion (BMRN), said the next-generation big financial institution may not come from Wall Street but from YouTube.
Speaking on stage at Consensus Hong Kong on Wednesday, Lee argued that MrBeast’s move into banking could position the video creator as the leading financial platform for Gen Z and Gen Alpha and a major on-ramp into crypto.
MrBeast’s company, in which BitMine invested $200 million, agreed earlier this month to buy neobank Step as part of a long-term play on how younger generations will access financial services.
“Beast has a chance to be the financial institution of its generation,” Lee said.
He likened the opportunity to how Charles Schwab served baby boomers, BlackRock and Blackstone attracted capital from Generation X, and Robinhood captured Millennials.
Generation Z and Generation Alpha, he noted, represent about 120 million people in the United States alone, and MrBeast has built an audience of more than 1 billion followers worldwide.
“These customers are not necessarily wealthy today,” Lee said, but over the next decade they will be participating in a major wealth transfer.
If Step becomes their primary financial platform, he argued, it could position BitMine and MrBeast’s investment in the company at the center of a generation that views digital assets as native to their financial lives.
