Stephen Findeisen, better known by his online alias Coffeezilla, is an American

YouTuber A YouTuber is an online personality and/or influencer who produces videos on the video-sharing platform YouTube, typically posting to their personal YouTube channel. The term was first used in the English language in 2006. Influence Influe ...

and crypto journalist who is known primarily for his channel in which he investigates and discusses alleged online

scams A confidence trick is an attempt to defraud a person or group after first gaining their trust. Confidence tricks exploit victims using their credulity, naïveté, compassion, vanity, confidence, irresponsibility, and greed. Researchers have de ...

, usually surrounding

cryptocurrency A cryptocurrency, crypto-currency, or crypto is a digital currency designed to work as a medium of exchange through a computer network that is not reliant on any central authority, such as a government or bank, to uphold or maintain it. It ...

decentralized finance Decentralized finance (often stylized as DeFi) offers financial instruments without relying on intermediaries such as brokerages, exchanges, or banks by using smart contracts on a blockchain. DeFi platforms allow people to lend or borrow funds ...

and

internet celebrities An Internet celebrity (also known as a social media influencer, social media personality, internet personality, or simply influencer) is a celebrity who has acquired or developed their fame and notability through the Internet. The rise of social m ...

. Before Coffeezilla, Findeisen was active on YouTube with the channel Coffee Break between 2017 and 2020.

Early life

Findeisen holds a degree in

chemical engineering Chemical engineering is an engineering field which deals with the study of operation and design of chemical plants as well as methods of improving production. Chemical engineers develop economical commercial processes to convert raw materials in ...

from

Texas A&M University Texas A&M University (Texas A&M, A&M, or TAMU) is a public, land-grant, research university in College Station, Texas. It was founded in 1876 and became the flagship institution of the Texas A&M University System in 1948. As of late 2021, T ...

. Before his YouTube career, he sold houses for a local builder.

Career

Career beginnings

Findeisen was motivated to hunt down scams after his mother, who had been diagnosed with cancer, was persuaded to buy questionable products with the belief that they would help cure her. His mother would later end up recovering after surgery. He began his career as a YouTuber by uploading videos in which he makes allegations about influencers and financial commentators.

Save the Kids token

He gained international recognition after making a series of videos that investigated

Save the Kids token Save the Kids token was a cryptocurrency token and pump and dump scheme which was marketed as a charity token meant to give a percentage of the transaction fee to a Binance-operated charity. The token was widely publicized by YouTube personalities ...

, a cryptocurrency widely seen as a

pump and dump Pump and dump (P&D) is a form of securities fraud that involves artificially inflating the price of an owned stock through false and misleading positive statements, in order to sell the cheaply purchased stock at a higher price. Once the opera ...

scheme. He claimed that former

FaZe Clan FaZe Clan (formerly FaZe Sniping) is a professional esports and entertainment organization headquartered in Los Angeles, California, USA. Founded on May 30, 2010, the organization has players from around the world, across multiple games, includ ...

member Frazier Khattri (FaZe Kay) collaborated with YouTube prankster

Sam Pepper Samuel Pepper (born 26 March 1989) is an English internet personality. He created his YouTube channel in 2010, accumulating over 2 million subscribers and 55 million video views . He joined TikTok in 2020 and has amassed more than 4 millio ...

. In response, Khattri's lawyers threatened to sue Findeisen in a

cease and desist A cease and desist letter is a document sent to an individual or business to stop alleged illegal activity. The phrase "cease and desist" is a legal doublet, made up of two near-synonyms. The letter may warn that, if the recipient does not dis ...

letter unless he retracted his statements, but Findeisen called the cease and desist letter "absolute toilet paper".

Safemoon

In April 2022, Findeisen accused the SafeMoon team for misappropriating millions of dollars. According to Findeisen, Safemoon CEO John Karony, has been removing funds from the

liquidity pool In finance, a dark pool (also black pool) is a private forum (alternative trading system or ATS) for trading securities, derivatives, and other financial instruments.blockchain A blockchain is a type of distributed ledger technology (DLT) that consists of growing lists of records, called ''blocks'', that are securely linked together using cryptography. Each block contains a cryptographic hash of the previous block, ...

transaction showing an outflow of 36.7 trillion tokens from the liquidity pool, dated March 5, 2021. Former SafeMoon CTO, Thomas Smith who had a role as a blockchain advisor for StrikeX, was dismissed by the company after the fraud allegations uncovered by Findeisen. Coffeezilla has made multiple other reports on Safemoon, including the pump and dump scheme against many influencers including

Soulja Boy DeAndre Cortez Way (born July 28, 1990), known professionally as Soulja Boy (formerly Soulja Boy Tell 'Em), is an American rapper and record producer. He rose to prominence, after his self published debut single " Crank That (Soulja Boy)" peak ...

Logan Paul Logan Alexander Paul (born April 1, 1995) is an American media personality, podcaster, actor, and professional wrestler. He is currently signed to WWE, where he performs on the Raw brand, but is inactive due to a knee injury. He has over 23 ...

Lil Yachty Miles Parks McCollum (born August 23, 1997), known professionally as Lil Boat, is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, and producer. He first gained recognition on the internet in 2015 for his singles " One Night" and "Minnesota" (featuring ...

, Ben Phillips amongst others as well as highlighting the controversy surrounding the Safemoon CEO suing his own mother.

FTX

Findeisen additionally was active during the

bankruptcy of FTX The bankruptcy of FTX is the ongoing liquidation of Bahamas-based cryptocurrency exchange FTX, beginning in November 2022. The collapse of FTX, caused by a liquidity crisis of the company's token, FTT, served as the impetus for its bankruptcy. Pr ...

, interviewing

FTX FTX Trading Ltd., commonly known as FTX (short for "Futures Exchange") is a bankrupt company that formerly operated a cryptocurrency exchange and crypto hedge fund. The exchange was founded in 2019 and, at its peak in July 2021, had over one mi ...

founder

Sam Bankman-Fried Samuel Benjamin Bankman-Fried (born March 6, 1992), also known by the initialism SBF, is an American suspected fraudster, entrepreneur, investor, and former billionaire. Bankman-Fried was the founder and CEO of the cryptocurrency exchange FT ...

on three occasions and describing Bankman-Fried's responses during the last interview as an admission of fraud. In light of his involvement with investigating FTX in particular, ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large n ...

'' credited Findeisen as one of the most powerful independent news sources when it comes to the cryptocurrency industry. In a February 2023 appearance on the

Lex Fridman Podcast Lex Fridman ( /'lɛks 'friːdmæn/; , Russian: ) is a Russian-American computer scientist, podcaster, and an artificial intelligence researcher. He is a research scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and he hosts the ''Lex Fri ...

, Findeisen bashed Bankman-Fried even further, explaining his whole process behind exposing the FTX scandal.

''CryptoZoo''

In December 2022, Findeisen published a three-part series on

NFT A non-fungible token (NFT) is a unique digital identifier that cannot be copied, substituted, or subdivided, that is recorded in a blockchain, and that is used to certify authenticity and ownership. The ownership of an NFT is recorded in the b ...

-based game ''CryptoZoo'', a project

developed and founded. He criticized the project for not delivering on its promises and alleged that the team engaged in

market manipulation In economics and finance, market manipulation is a type of market abuse where there is a deliberate attempt to interfere with the free and fair operation of the market; the most blatant of cases involve creating false or misleading appearan ...

. In a now-deleted video, Paul responded to the allegations, while also threatening legal action against Findeisen for

defamation Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defi ...

and claiming that Findeisen broke "criminal and civil laws" by uploading a recording of a phone call with his manager, Jeff Levinan. He has since withdrawn the threat.

References

{{Reflist

External links

YouTube Channel Coffeezilla

YouTube Channel Coffee Break
2018 establishments in the United States American male journalists American video bloggers American YouTubers English-language YouTube channels Living people Social media influencers Texas A&M University alumni YouTube channels launched in 2018 YouTube controversies YouTubers from Texas Year of birth missing (living people)