today on Forbes, these entrepreneurs went all in on a crypto casino and became billionaires. It's fitting that Ed Craven and Bejan Tyan first met online, where as enterprising teenagers, they developed a way for players of RuneScape, an old-school online video game, to wager on fights between them using in-game digital gold coins. The scheme, called staking, was profitable until it reportedly got them booted from the platform. Craven, who's Australian, says with a sly smile, I wouldn't say so much kicked off, but it definitely wasn't looked too highly upon by the game's creators. Just over a decade later, the 28-year-old Craven and 30-year-old Tyan run stake.com, the largest offshore crypto casino in the world. Stake generated $2.6 billion in revenue last year, despite crypto gambling being unavailable in the United States, United Kingdom, and much of Europe. The pair's instinct for marketing and willingness to operate in legal gray areas have made them two of the youngest self-made

billionaires in the world worth an estimated $1.3 billion each. Craven and Tyan, who operate from Melbourne, Australia, have used their fortunes to put Stak's name on Formula 1 cars, English Premier League jerseys, UFC octagons, and a new live streaming service. But what they really want more than anything is legitimacy, for which no price is too high. Craven says, We've taken two of the most controversial technologies and industries and combined them, so it's always been an uphill battle for us to beat public perception of what the company may stand for. The duo began dabbling with crypto in 2013 when Bitcoin was trading for around $100. Along with a few friends, they coded a primitive game called Prime Dice, which lets users bet Bitcoin on the roll of virtual die. Prime Dice generated enough profit to make it a full-time job for its teenage creators. Their ambitions grew in the spring of 2016 when they opened an office in Melbourne and founded their company, Eigo, with 18

employees eigo launched stake the following year eventually adding slots, table games, and a sports book. With all wagers in cryptocurrency, their timing was great. By late 2017, a single Bitcoin was worth north of $10,000, and an ever-growing number of people believed it could be the future of money. In that early period, crypto laws and regulations were practically non-existent, and casinos could get licensed in offshore havens like kurau, where stake is licensed, and taxes are minimal. The lack of oversight enabled stake to keep costs low and offer gamblers better odds. Players were kept anonymous from authorities and paid no transaction fees. The category grew in popularity, and in search of young, risk-tolerant customers, Craven found a new breed of willing pitchmen: content creators. Stake began paying some of them $1 million per month or more to gamble on the live streaming platform Twitch, often wagering funds seemingly provided by stake. When the pandemic lockdowns more than doubled Twitch's viewership, Craven says that it put rocket boosters on the

operation a blockbuster partnership worth a reported $100 million with rap Superstar and high-stake sports better Drake followed in 2022 giving stake mainstream visibility. Between 2020 and 2022 st's gross Gaming revenue Rose from around $100 million to more than $2 billion giving it a dominant share of the crypto Casino Market. The company still self-funded and split 50/50 between Craven and Tyran earned hundreds of millions of dollars in profits. The founders began living like Rockefellers literally. Tyan purchased a 47 million do Manhattan townhouse previously owned by David Rockefeller and Craven bought two homes in Melbourne's posh turac neighborhood for Combined $76 million. The two have also been willing to spend lavishly on marketing. Stake is paying $12 million a year for an English Premier League soccer jersey sponsorship and $100 million over 3 years to become the naming right sponsor of a Formula 1 team. Tyani says quote it's not Roi based.

at all, but I feel like when you have people's attention, you should invest everything you can to hold on to that. For full coverage, check out Matt Craig's piece on forbes.com. This is Kieran Meadows from Forbes. Thanks for tuning in. [Music]

These Entrepreneurs Are Billionaires Thanks To A Crypto Casino

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