Global top influencer MrBeast has become a big name for Tom Lee

$200 million is the number just announced today.

BitMine Immersion Technologies (BMNR), chaired by renowned Wall Street analyst Tom Lee, announced it will invest in the parent company Beast Industries behind the top influencer MrBeast (Beast). Meanwhile, Beast Industries mentioned in an official statement that the company will explore how to “integrate DeFi into the upcoming financial services platform.”

If you only look at the news, this seems like another familiar crossover: traditional finance, crypto, internet celebrities, entrepreneurship. On one side is the YouTube giant with over 400 million total subscribers, where a single video can cause the algorithm to automatically favor you; on the other side is a top-tier analyst on Wall Street who excels at weaving blockchain grand concepts into balance sheets—everything seems logical.

The Path to MrBeast

Looking back at MrBeast’s early videos, it’s hard to connect them with today’s $5 billion valuation of Beast Industries.

In 2017, shortly after graduating high school, Jimmy Donaldson( uploaded a video of himself counting from 1 to 44 hours straight—“Challenge: Count from 1 to 100000!” The content was so simple it was almost childish, with no plot, no editing, just one person facing the camera, repeatedly repeating numbers. Yet, this became a turning point in his content career.

At that time, he was under 19, with only about 13,000 subscribers. The video quickly surpassed one million views, becoming the first viral phenomenon globally.

Later, in interviews, he recalled that period and said:

“I wasn’t really trying to go viral; I just wanted to see if, by dedicating all my time to something no one else wanted to do, the results would be different.”

Jimmy Donaldson’s channel succeeded, transforming into the well-known MrBeast. But more importantly, from that moment on, he formed an almost obsessive belief: attention is not a gift from talent, but earned through投入 and endurance.

) Treating YouTube as a business, not just a platform for creation

Many creators, after gaining fame, choose to “conserve”: reduce risks, improve efficiency, and turn content into stable cash flow.

MrBeast took the opposite approach.

He repeatedly emphasized in interviews:

“Almost all the money I make is spent on the next video.”

This is the core of his business model.

By 2024, his main channel has over 460 million subscribers, with total video views exceeding 100 billion. But behind this is extremely high costs:

• Cost of producing a top-tier video, consistently around 3 to 5 million USD;
• Some large challenges or charity projects can cost over 10 million USD;
• On Amazon Prime Video, “Beast Games,” the first season he described as “completely out of control,” and in interviews, he admitted it lost tens of millions of dollars.

He said this without showing regret:

“If I don’t do this, viewers will go watch others.
At this level, you can’t save money and still expect to win.”

This statement is almost the key to understanding Beast Industries.

Beast Industries: $400 million annual revenue, but thin profit margins

By 2024, MrBeast consolidated all his businesses under the name Beast Industries.

From public information, this company has far exceeded the scope of a “creator side business”:

• Annual revenue over $400 million;
• Business spans content production, fast-moving consumer goods retail, licensed merchandise, and tools;
• After the latest round of funding, market valuation is generally expected around $5 billion.

But it’s not easy.

MrBeast’s YouTube main channel and Beast Games bring huge exposure but almost consume all profits.

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In stark contrast is his chocolate brand Feastables. Public data shows that in 2024, Feastables sales were about $250 million, contributing over $20 million in profit. This marks Beast Industries’ first stable, replicable cash flow business. By the end of 2025, Feastables had entered over 30,000 retail stores across North America (including Walmart, Target, 7-Eleven, etc.), covering the US, Canada, and Mexico, greatly enhancing the brand’s offline sales capacity.

MrBeast has openly stated multiple times that the cost of video production is rising and becoming increasingly difficult to recoup. Yet he continues to invest heavily in content creation because, in his view, this is not just paying for videos but buying traffic for the entire business ecosystem.

The core barrier of the chocolate business is not production but the ability to reach consumers. While other brands need to spend huge sums on advertising, he only needs to release a video. Whether the video itself is profitable is no longer important; as long as Feastables continues to sell, this business loop can keep running.

) “I’m actually a broke guy”

In early 2026, MrBeast revealed in an interview with The Wall Street Journal that he is a “broke guy,” sparking discussion:

“I’m basically in ‘negative cash’ right now. Everyone says I’m a billionaire, but I don’t have much in my bank account.”

This is not “bragging,” but a natural result of his business model.

MrBeast’s wealth is highly concentrated in unlisted equity; although he holds just over 50% of Beast Industries, the company continues to expand and almost never pays dividends. He even deliberately keeps no cash on hand. In June 2025, he revealed that because he kept reinvesting almost all his savings into video production and business expansion, he once had to borrow money from his mother to pay for his wedding.

As he later explained more plainly:

“I don’t look at my bank balance—that affects my decisions.”

And his investment tracks are no longer limited to content and consumer goods.

In fact, during the NFT boom in 2021, on-chain records show he bought and traded multiple CryptoPunks, some sold at prices around 120 ETH (roughly hundreds of thousands of dollars at the time).

![image.png]###https://img-cdn.gateio.im/social/moments-513c78c46971312e3574d26a85f15d77 “1768522926406908.png”(

However, as the market entered a correction phase, his attitude became more cautious.

The real turning point is that “MrBeast”’s own business model has reached a critical edge.

When a person controls the world’s top traffic entry points but remains in a state of high investment, cash tightness, and expansion relying on financing, finance is no longer just an investment option but a fundamental infrastructure that must be reconstructed.

In recent years, internal discussions within Beast Industries have increasingly focused on: how to make users no longer just “watch content, buy products,” but enter into a long-term, stable, sustainable economic relationship?

This is precisely the direction that traditional internet platforms have been exploring for years: payments, accounts, credit systems. And at this juncture, the emergence of Tom Lee and BitMine Immersion (BMNR) points this path toward a more structured possibility.

) Collaborating with Tom Lee to build the DeFi foundation

On Wall Street, Tom Lee has always played the role of “narrative architect.” From early explanations of Bitcoin’s value logic to emphasizing Ethereum’s strategic importance in corporate balance sheets, he is skilled at translating technological trends into financial language. BMNR’s investment in Beast Industries is not about chasing internet celebrity hype but betting on the programmable future of attention gateways.

So, what does DeFi mean here?

Current public information is very restrained: no token issuance, no yield promises, no fan-exclusive financial products. But the phrase “integrate DeFi into financial services platforms” points to several possibilities:

• Lower-cost payment and settlement layers;

• Programmable account systems for creators and fans;

• Asset recording and rights structures based on decentralized mechanisms.

The potential is vast, but so are the risks. Mishandling could undermine years of trust assets. MrBeast’s emphasis on trust may be the most critical constraint in this experiment. After all, he once said:

“If what I do someday harms the audience, I’d rather do nothing.”

This statement may be repeatedly tested in every future financialization attempt.

So, when the world’s most powerful attention machine begins to seriously build financial infrastructure, will it become a new platform or just an overly bold crossover?

The answer won’t be revealed soon.

But one thing he knows better than anyone: the greatest capital is not past glory but the right to “start over.”

After all, he is only 27 years old.

Author: Seed.eth