Most people in this series earned their crypto influence inside crypto. FaZe Banks imported his from somewhere else entirely: fifteen years of gaming and internet celebrity, millions of followers, and a Rolodex covering half of online entertainment. When he pointed all of that at meme coins, the results were explosive in every sense of the word.
His arc since then includes a token that collapsed 93%, leaked group chats, a resignation, and, somehow, a markets podcast with one of crypto’s biggest traders. Whatever else you say about him, the story is never boring. Here it is in full.
Who Is FaZe Banks?
FaZe Banks is the online name of Richard “Ricky” Bengtson, an American internet personality, entrepreneur, and longtime face of FaZe Clan, posting as @Banks on X. He arrived in crypto as a full-blown celebrity, not a trader, and that distinction explains most of what followed.
The short version:
- Early member, co-owner, and eventually CEO of FaZe Clan, one of the biggest brands in gaming history
- Millions of followers across X, YouTube, and Instagram built over a decade of internet fame
- Central figure of the “LA Vape Cabal” era of meme coin influencers in 2024–2025
- Promoter of the MLG meme coin, whose collapse became one of the cycle’s defining controversies
- Co-host, alongside Ansem, of the Market Bubble podcast launched in 2026
His crypto influence never came from trading skill. It came from being one of the most connected people in online entertainment, at the exact moment meme coins became entertainment.
How Did FaZe Banks Become Famous?
The FaZe Clan arc. Banks joined FaZe Clan in its early Call of Duty days and became one of its owners and its most recognizable face. Through the 2010s, FaZe grew from a trick-shot YouTube crew into a gaming and entertainment empire: content houses, celebrity investors, merchandise, and hundreds of millions of fans across its roster.
The peak and the crash. In July 2022, FaZe Clan went public through a SPAC at a valuation around $725 million. The stock then collapsed by well over 90%, becoming a symbol of the creator-economy bubble. The company was eventually delisted and acquired, and in 2024 Banks led a buyback of the brand, returning as CEO to reboot FaZe around its original creator DNA. The comeback earned him real goodwill in gaming circles.
The crypto era. Around the same time, Banks went deep into meme coins. He relocated his social circle into what Crypto Twitter dubbed the LA Vape Cabal, a loose crew of influencers including Threadguy and Frank DeGods, operating out of Los Angeles at the center of the celebrity meme coin wave. Casino money followed the audience too: Banks became one of gaming’s most visible crypto casino promoters, including sponsorship work for Rollbit, the crypto casino we covered in detail in our Rollbit review.
The podcast era. In April 2026, Banks launched Market Bubble, a markets-and-culture podcast co-hosted with Ansem, presented by Polymarket. Pairing crypto’s most famous trader with gaming’s most connected celebrity was a deliberate formula, and the show quickly pulled major guests from both worlds.
The MLG Coin Controversy
Every profile in this series has its stress-test chapter. This one is Banks’s, and it is the heaviest.
In late 2024 and early 2025, Banks aggressively promoted MLG, a Solana meme coin built on gaming nostalgia, alongside Adin Ross and Frank DeGods. He told his audience it was the perfect crypto entry point for gamers, while stating he had zero affiliation with the team, had not been paid, and would not touch his bag below a $100 million market cap. Fueled by that celebrity push, MLG ran from a few million to nearly $200 million in market cap.
Then it collapsed, eventually sitting more than 90% below its high. The fallout consumed the influencer world around it. In July 2025, Adin Ross bought MLG live on stream, watched it dump immediately, and publicly turned on the group. Leaked messages then surfaced appearing to show Banks pressuring the MLG team for preferential over-the-counter token allocations, directly at odds with the no-affiliation framing. Critics accused him and the wider Vape Cabal of accumulating tokens, promoting them to fans, and selling into the hype, with similar accusations attached to a string of earlier coins promoted from the group’s orbit.
On July 28, 2025, amid the scrutiny, Banks stepped down as CEO of FaZe Clan.
The essential caveats: Banks has denied running a pump and dump, no charges or regulatory findings have been brought against him, and leaked screenshots are not court evidence. The LIBRA episode that engulfed Threadguy touched him too, via his infamous call-in about being up early on the token, and he likewise denied any insider involvement there. What is beyond dispute is the pattern of outcomes: multiple coins, massive celebrity-driven pumps, devastating losses for the audiences who followed them in.
Why Does FaZe Banks Move Markets?
Imported reach. Banks commands an audience most crypto natives cannot fathom, built across fifteen years of gaming content. When he posts a token, millions of people see it who follow zero other crypto accounts.
The connector role. His deeper influence is social. Banks sits at the center of a network linking streamers, musicians, athletes, and crypto insiders. He is often the bridge through which mainstream celebrities touch meme coins at all, which multiplies his effect far beyond his own posts.
Audience trust built elsewhere. His followers’ loyalty was earned through a decade of gaming content, then spent in a market those followers barely understood. That transfer of trust is exactly why celebrity promotions move prices, and exactly why they draw so much scrutiny when prices collapse.
The asymmetry deserves stating plainly: a celebrity risks reputation. The audience risks rent money. Those are not comparable downsides.
Has FaZe Banks Been Right?
As a builder of internet-culture businesses, his record is genuinely impressive. FaZe Clan became a generational brand, the buyback-and-reboot showed real conviction, and Market Bubble was a shrewd read on where crypto media was heading.
As a source of market judgment, the public record is grim. The tokens he promoted hardest are overwhelmingly deep in the red from their hype peaks, MLG most famously. His public framing throughout, that these were cultural entry points for gamers, aged about as badly as the charts did. Whatever his intentions, following his coin promotion has been a reliably losing strategy, and that is the only fact a beginner needs from this section.
Criticism
Banks attracts the sharpest criticism of anyone in this series, and the themes are consistent:
- Dumping allegations. The MLG leaks and the pattern of collapsed promotions form the core accusation: that celebrity reach was used to distribute tokens onto fans. He denies it, nothing has been proven formally, and the accusation defines his crypto reputation regardless.
- The disclosure gap. His “zero affiliation” claims sat uneasily beside leaked evidence of preferential allocation requests, which for many observers settled the credibility question independent of any legal standard.
- Casino promotion to young audiences. His sponsorship work for crypto casinos, aimed at an audience raised on his gaming content, draws the same criticism directed at gambling sponsorships across streaming, amplified by crypto’s lack of guardrails.
- Collateral damage. The MLG fallout consumed friendships, ended his FaZe CEO run, and dragged the whole Vape Cabal era into disrepute, feeding the perception that the celebrity meme coin wave was extractive from top to bottom.
Should Beginners Follow FaZe Banks?
For entertainment and internet-culture business lessons, there are worse follows. For anything involving your money, the record answers the question.
- Celebrity attention is a sell signal as often as a buy signal. By the time a mainstream celebrity promotes a coin, the informed money is positioned and waiting. You are the demand they were waiting for.
- Disclaimers are not diligence. “I’m not paid” and “consider every dollar zero” cost nothing to say and protect only the person saying them. Verify on-chain, not on vibes.
- Learn the checklist instead. Liquidity, holder concentration, and team allocation would have flagged every disaster in this story before it happened. Our cornerstone guide on what makes a good meme coin covers all of it.
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My Take
I will keep this one short, because unlike some others in this series, I have no personal story with Banks, and honestly, his corner of crypto is the one I understand least.
Not the business, to be clear. The business I understand perfectly: attention acquired in gaming, converted into crypto flows, monetized through promotions, casinos, and now a podcast. It is the mystique I have never gotten. Crypto Twitter treats Banks as a heavyweight, and as far as I can tell, the aura rests entirely on LA-scene gravity: the house, the parties, the celebrity proximity, the sense that he is a big guy in a city that runs on seeming like one. Strip that away and look only at the crypto record, the promotions, the charts, the leaks, and I struggle to find anything a trader should respect.
The Market Bubble pairing with Ansem is, I will admit, clever. Ansem brings the trading credibility, Banks brings the bookings, and the show works better than either could alone. That is Banks’s real skill and always has been: assembling rooms he benefits from being in. Just remember, when his content reaches you, which side of that room you are on.
Final Words
FaZe Banks’s story runs from Call of Duty trick shots to a $725 million public company, through collapse, comeback, the Vape Cabal, the MLG wreckage, and out the other side into a podcast chair next to crypto’s most famous trader. As a study in how internet fame converts across industries, it has no equal in this series.
As a source of trading guidance, it is a cautionary tale with excellent production values. Enjoy the show, protect your stack, and if you want the full cast of this era, our profiles of Orangie and the rest of the meme coin KOLs cover how the whole attention machine fits together.
If you enjoyed this one, check out our other meme coin related content.
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FAQ
Who is FaZe Banks?
FaZe Banks is Richard “Ricky” Bengtson, an American internet personality, early member and former CEO of FaZe Clan, and a central figure in the celebrity meme coin era of 2024–2025. He now co-hosts the Market Bubble podcast with crypto trader Ansem.
What is FaZe Banks’s real name?
His real name is Richard Bengtson, commonly known as Ricky Banks. He built his fame through FaZe Clan, one of the biggest gaming and entertainment brands in the world.
Why did FaZe Banks step down as FaZe CEO?
Banks stepped down as FaZe Clan CEO in July 2025 amid the fallout from the MLG meme coin collapse, which included public accusations, a falling-out with Adin Ross, and leaked messages about his involvement with the token.
What is the MLG coin?
MLG, also known as 360noscope420blazeit, is a Solana meme coin built on gaming nostalgia that FaZe Banks, Adin Ross, and Frank DeGods heavily promoted around early 2025. It ran to nearly $200 million in market cap before collapsing more than 90%, triggering pump-and-dump accusations that Banks denies.
That is the core accusation against him, fueled by MLG’s collapse and leaked messages appearing to show him seeking preferential token allocations. Banks denies running a pump and dump, and no formal charges or findings exist. Treat every celebrity coin promotion as potentially conflicted regardless.
What is the LA Vape Cabal?
The LA Vape Cabal was Crypto Twitter’s nickname for the Los Angeles influencer circle around FaZe Banks, Threadguy, and Frank DeGods that dominated celebrity meme coin promotion in 2024–2025. The label turned toxic after the LIBRA and MLG controversies.
What podcast does FaZe Banks host?
Banks co-hosts Market Bubble with Ansem. The show launched in April 2026, is presented by Polymarket, and covers crypto, markets, prediction markets, and internet culture with guests from both crypto and mainstream entertainment.
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