07/23/2023

Why One Actor Became a Face of the Anti-crypto Movement

He is an unlikely opponent to the currency

Ben McKenzie is an unlikely anti-crypto crusader. The actor is best known for his role as a teen heartthrob on The O.C., which is not exactly a harbinger of technological or economic rigor.

But McKenzie also has an economics bachelor's degree from the University of Virginia, and has studied the long history of financial frauds around the world. Based on that foundation of knowledge, McKenzie became obsessed with crypto's rise in 2021, convinced that it was little more than a house of cards that would inevitably topple.

That August, McKenzie reached out to the journalist Jacob Silverman and proposed collaborating together on crypto journalism that would expose its potential dangers and seedy underbelly. McKenzie believed he could wield his public profile to add some nuance to a crypto discourse that mostly surfed high on optimism and euphoria.

Please select this link to read the complete article from TIME.